Remember when I wrote that Reaghan was starting dance class this fall? Her Winter Showcase was last weekend and it was a-dorable.

Milestones
She can finally clap her hands!! She can give high fives and loves to do it! She started taking a step or 2 at a time!!! We love to practice with her every night. We thought she'd be walking by Christmas but she can't seem to get past the second step... really its like a step and a half. She is so close though. She stands really well on her own, especially if she's holding something in her hand.




Sibling Love
Reaghan is teaching Lilly how to share... "let sissy have it." She is working on trading toys with Lilly if Lil takes something she was playing with, so she can get her toy back. Lilly can be a little rough sometimes with grabbing faces and hair but Reaghan always takes it like a champ and gives sweet reminders... "Be nice Lilly, be nice. Don't hurt big sissy." Reaghan still calls her sweet heart and always makes sure she has a toy to take when we leave the house or that her sun shade is pulled up on her car seat.



Special Events/Outings
She celebrated her first Thanksgiving and loved all of the food! Decorated her first Christmas tree and Christmas cookies. She's done way better with the tree and presents than I thought she would. I was not looking forward to her terrorizing the tree all season but she's actually been so good about it! We have to tell her no every once in a while but she's mostly left it alone! Went to Christmas Town twice and she enjoyed Aunt Nin Nin carrying her in the Ergo carrier almost the whole time. 



I always feel like her monthly updates say negative things about her... I mean, Lilly Jean is our crazy girl but we sure do love her for it! She brings all the spunk and attitude to our family that we could ever need right now! I can't wait to celebrate Christmas morning with her and can not believe she is getting so close to being a year old!

Milestones
She's a cruising and crawling pro. All over the place all the time! She is moving all around in her little walker. She is starting to let go of the couch and stand on her own for a few seconds before falling back to her bum. She can wave "bye-bye" now. She likes to make growling sounds and say mama and dada, and nana... but honestly most of the time she just squeals and screams. She can point with her finger, but not at anything in particular. She gives kisses. She recognizes and responds to her name. She can't clap but likes to put her hands together and twist them back and forth. Her new thing is to share something or show me what she picks up. I love it, its adorable!







Sibling Love
Lilly thinks everything Reaghan does is super funny. They love to make each other laugh, which is the best. Recently I've allowed Reaghan to get up in the morning to go to the bathroom instead of waiting for me to get her up and so if she hears Lilly up when she gets up she'll go into Lilly's room and play with her until I go and get them. She tosses all sorts of toys in to her crib and then stands on a stool looking into the crib and talking to her. *heart melt* She loves to put Lilly's hands together and teach her to pray.  

Special Events/Outings
We went on another vacation to the mountains last month. She did pretty good on the 4 hour car ride. We only had to stop once each way, which was great for both her and Reaghan. She dressed up as Curious George for her first Halloween/Harvest Festivals and was the cutest monkey ever. Went to the Pumpkin Patch for the first time. Had a special babysitting night with Uncle Noah while mommy and daddy took Reag to the Lion King. 

My grandma, Aunt Linda and cousin Lindy are in town this week so on our "Kessler Tuesday" {the day of the week my siblings get together at my parent's house to hang out} we had a brunch date!

The Bee & The Biscuit is a new super cute brunch spot in the country {that's also sort of near the beach... welcome to coastal Va.!} that has been all the rage this past summer. It's an old house near a farm that was turned into a restaurant. Friends had been visiting and posting pictures of amazing latte's all summer long and I had been wanting to go so I'm glad we finally gave ourselves a reason to drive 25 minutes out to this place, and you know what? It was totally worth it.

Have you ever had some mommy fails? I'm not talking about the "I forgot to feed my kid a vegetable today." or even the "I forgot to re-apply the sunscreen" fails. I mean the self fails. The "crap, I should not have said/done that" fails.

I've had 2 big ones recently and I just wanted to kick myself both times.

One was being a little overly frustrated trying to get Reaghan to dance class one time. We were running 5 minutes behind and I knew we'd get there right on time as it was, but on our way we encountered a school bus stopping to let kids off, every red light possible, the shortest light in the history of man that only let 5 cars through at a time right at 5pm, and drivers that thought it would be fun to go 5 under the speed limit. I kid you not, I thought I was going to lose it. Actually, I kind of did. I grumbled, I may have exclaimed loudly "Drive people, drive!" once or twice and I think I banged the steering wheel with my fist. If that doesn't paint a pretty picture of myself... yikes. Truth is you guys, that that's not the first time I've ever lost my patience like that. but now? I have 2 little girls in the back seat. One 3 year old in particular watching my every move and asking "Are you frustrated mommy?" *face palm*

Ugh.

Mom Fail.

Ugh.

Christ follower fail.

It's so hard sometimes to remember that everything I say to my sweet girls means nothing if I can't live it out in my own life. I can't speak to Reaghan about self control when I don't exhibit it in my own life.

I am so thankful for grace. Sometimes I sit too high on my self righteous horse thinking I've got it all together and then my wretchedness comes out. My sin. My ugliness. The things that sit deep in my heart... impatience, a short temper, selfishness... they come out in my actions sometimes and I hate it. Thank God that His mercies are new every morning, which is good because that's how often I need it. More, actually.

In case you're wondering, we made it to dance class just fine. 8 minutes late, but it was fine. Because its a 3-4 year old ballet class, not the Nut Cracker. I lost my cool over being late to a 3 year old's dance class. *face palm again*


So much responsibility in raising this little ballerina. It's scary sometimes. Scary and humbling realizing how much influence I will have in her life. I know there are daily opportunities to show her how to live a Godly, virtuous life... but also daily opportunities to show her how much her mommy needs Jesus, and how much she needs Jesus too. My prayer isn't just that I would never lose my patience in front of her again{because I'm sure I will no matter how hard I try} but I think its that when I do fail, I would be humble enough to apologize and share with her my need for a savior - share with her His unending mercies for us when we do fail.

Last weekend we took Reaghan to see her first play! A couple years ago I probably would've said it would be a little ridiculous to take a 3 year old to a play. Even as I type that I think it sounds crazy, a 3 years old at a Broadway "type" play?! But I'm so glad we went. Reaghan and her cousin Brooklyn are really into Lion King right now, it is one of their favorite movies, So when we saw through our zoo membership that the Hurrah Players {a family theater group based in Hampton Roads}were putting on this play and we could get a discount on tickets with our zoo passes, we thought it would be fun to take them!

We've been trying to have special "big girl dates" with Reaghan every now and then since Lilly was born. Usually it is a daddy daughter date somewhere... sometimes its spending special one on one time with mommy to do nails or crafts... more recently I took her to the movies just the two of us and we had a fun little girls night! Anyways, this was an extra special big girl date because it was with mommy AND daddy while Lilly stayed home with Uncle Noah. :)

We took our annual fall trip to the mountains to pick apples this past week! It is definitely a trip I look forward to every year and this year was our first time with Lilly. Every time I go on vacation I remember how un-vacation like it is with little kids, BUT at the same time, how much fun it is. I mean, what did I do on this trip before I had babies to take care of??? Yes it would be more relaxing if it were just Mark and I, but it would seem a little meaningless...

We both took more time off of work this year. Usually we only go up for a long weekend, but we stayed for 5 days this time. There is always so much to do, we are busy every day!

Saturday: Our week this year fell earlier in October than usual so we were up there for our favorite craft festival - Dayton Days. I bought homemade bibs, a cute dance bag for Reag for Christmas, and bows! We ate fried apple pies and funnel cakes! Kind of bummed that it was 80 degrees out and we didn't have crisp, chilly air.

As I mentioned in my last post about all that Reaghan loves at 3 years of age, she L O V E S Moana.

Have you seen it? Reaghan was hooked after the first time she watched it and I actually enjoy it too. Which if you know me isn't that surprising because I love me some Disney movies. We listen to the songs on repeat pretty regularly and are actually headed to our local Zoo tomorrow evening because they are showing Moana on their outside screen! SO of course Reaghan's birthday had to have a Moana theme.

Do you do themed birthdays? We've kept Reaghan's parties family only up to this point, and probably will until she's 5 or so, but we still enjoy having a little theme to go along with it. Someone was selling some pretty intense Moana decorations on our facebook yard sale site (complete with a boat made out of pallets that had a sail!) that were super adorable but I realized that would be going overboard a bit. We did buy some Moana balloons, plates and napkins and then just used some dollar tree table cloths and streamers and a bouquet of carnations from the grocery store. A friend made some killer cupcakes and I had fun creating a super easy Moana cake. (That looked better than it tasted... thank goodness for the baker friends cupcakes!) I think its fun to see Reaghan excited about the decorations that we put up for her birthday. I love that it makes her day special and memorable. She is still enjoying her Moana balloons almost 2 weeks later so it was worth the money spent. : )

Milestones
She's been working on crawling for the last several weeks and finally put it together on Labor Day! She'll also roll herself around to get where she wants to go. She can go from her belly to sitting all on her own. She responds to her name. She is finally riding quietly in the car now that I put her car seat in the middle close to Reaghan, she actually falls asleep now! She isn't babbling any real words or sounds yet. She basically just likes to shriek and squeal.



Sibling Love
Reaghan is not a fan when Lilly tries to get her puzzles or put her toys in her mouth. She likes to decide what toys Lilly can play with. She is a big help to me when I ask her to "keep Lilly company" while I do a quick chore. One day this month we were out back playing and I had put Lilly in the swing,.. I walked away to get something and a few moments later heard laughing, I turned around to see Reaghan pushing Lilly in the swing and they were giggling to each other. It was precious.

Special Events/Outings
She napped through a solar eclipse! Came to see sissy at VBS a couple nights and also stayed home and bonded with daddy on other nights, She no longer screams for him while I'm in the shower or at work. haha We went to Grammies first MACU volleyball game and Aunt Sara's first volleyball game of her senior year. Lilly loved both and was very vocal for both. She visited the Zoo for the first time and was a content little baby in the stroller.