The Nalley Family

The Nalley Family
Eddie, Stephanie, Brooklyn, Chandler and Gibson

Wednesday, October 1, 2014

Fair 2014

Fair.....ly certain I'm thankful the fair only comes once a year!  =)


Eddie had to work on their fair day this year so I attempted taking these three cuties to the fair by myself in brutally hot temperatures.


Fortunately, Brooklyn's bestie, Elise, and her mom and brother joined us, too!!


So it was the 2 of us adults and these 5 little cuties!


Fortunately for me, Elise's mom, Kayli is a State Fair expert!!


Getting all 5 to look at the camera and smile = impossible!
We started off doing "Little Hands on the Farm"...it's free!
Then we headed over to the petting zoo and looked at all the animals.
Then it was time for rides!
Brooklyn was tall enough to ride a "real" roller coaster and was all about it!
Chandler and Elise were too scared so Kayli took them to do another ride and I had Gibson so I couldn't ride with her so Brave Brooklyn rode it all by herself!!


And loved it!!  
We saw Big Tex!

And Kayli introduced us to the FREE children's area!!
What?!?
It had this giant elephant the kids had a blast playing on!
a little shaded tent  (that I can't find my pictures of), 
where the kids could go in and decorate these tiny pumpkins
This playhouse that was fenced in...perfect for my wandering little fella...where this giant bubble blower constantly blew giant bubbles!!
Inside this playhouse was face painting.  
There were also these little covered sandboxes where the kids played for a while.
And there was another area with a puppet show.  
I'm hoping to find the rest of these pictures!!  
The kids had a blast...it wore me out!!

Good-Bye Summer!

Here are a few of the fun things we did this summer!

Brooklyn finished up a great soccer season and got a trophy!

 Birthday Parties!

Petting zoo birthday...feeding a giant turtle
 Super-hero party
 Frozen-themed birthday
 The girls got to meet Elsa and had a sing/dance along to all the songs from the Frozen soundtrack with Elsa!
 Brooklyn had her first sleepover and LOVED it.
Yes, same shirt because it was also "Frozen" themed.
 Swim party that started off with some "dot art" coloring sheets...
Check out Chan's super-curly hair from sleeping in braids the night before!
 Chandler swimming with a chocolate covered cupcake face!

Random:
The girls stood on this "tree stump" every Sunday when we got to church and wanted their pictures taken.  All their idea and look how sweet they are holding hands!  Melt my heart.

Playdates!

Chandler had Ellery over for a playmate!
 And the day was nice enough for them to have a picnic!
 We had a playdate just with our kids at Chick-fil-A
 And the girls were so sweet to take turns sharing their ice cream with G.
 I had the privilege of keeping my niece and nephew for a few days (with TONS of help from my Mother-in-law) while their parents were moving into a new house.
 The kids all had so much fun hanging out with their cousins!



 Brooklyn had her friend Ava (from swim team) come and play one afternoon.
 We took her to do one of our favorite things...
Snow cones at the Carwash!
 I also had a fun playdate with my friend, Melanie, when she came in town for work.
She works for Tyson so we got to live the high life and use the Tyson suite at the Rangers game!!
And it was SWEET!!  Gonna be hard to go back to the cheap seats after that!!
 Our precious friend, Elise, spent lots of time at our house this summer and we loved it!
All of us!
 Eddie and I had some friends come in town so we did the most random thing in the world!
Murder Mystery Dinner!!
(Disclaimer - I did not know he had his mouth on the fake gun until I looked at the picture and they had already moved on to the next table...eeeek!)
 One of the girls at our table was "in" on the show, but we did not know it at the time...at least we weren't supposed to know it, but we are such keen detectives that we kind-of suspected it!
 Playdate at the splash park with the Robinsons



 Playdate at the bounce house with the Wyatt Women followed by a yummy lunch!
 Swim date at the Glazes
 B's best friend from school, Addison, got to come play one day!
 And I had the privilege of keeping 2/3 of the Glaze girls one night.
We used that night to do our ICE BUCKET CHALLENGE that the girls all loved!!
 G's playdate with Carolina!  
When she wasn't hitting his face, she was busy kissing it to make it all better!

Swim Team

 I mean, seriously?  Have you ever seen a cuter little swimmer in your life?!?
 This was our first year to try swim team and Brooklyn loved it.
 For the first 6 weeks of summer, she went to early morning practices 3 times a week plus had 1 meet each week.  That's a LOT of swimming!!
 I was so impressed at her technique and determination!  She gave it her all!
 This summer was a particularly cool one, and with practices starting before the pool was open, many mornings the water was freezing and much of this pool was in the shade still at that early hour.
 B has ZERO body fat to help warm her up, so lots of times she was blue and shivering, but she still wanted to get up and try again the next morning.
 Although she didn't get many blue (or red) ribbons or qualify for sectionals, she couldn't have made us more proud!  Lots of times, the thing that hurt her time is that she would be daydreaming and not starting with the whistle.  She would hear everyone else jump in and then remember to jump in herself and would often start behind.
 At the end of summer, they had an awards banquet where everyone got a trophy.
She was THRILLED when they called her name.

After all the trophies were given out, there were just a very few special awards given out...
and Brooklyn received one of these which is a VERY BIG DEAL!!  All of her hardwork with cold, early morning swim practices had NOT gone unnoticed by her coaches.  She received the award for most improved!!!  Way to go, B!!
And here she is with her swim team friends and "relay race group."
Overall, this was a very positive experience for us and we can't wait to do it again next summer!!

While we were dolling Brooklyn up for her swim team banquet, we were also getting Chandler ready for her performance that concluded her week at camp!

I think these are actually Brooklyn's hands, but Chandler's looked exactly the same.  We found the perfect occasion to sport these fancy nails the Buie's got for them!
Chandler's camp was an art, music and drama camp and they did a performace on stage the last night.
Much to my surprise, Chandler was not afraid or nervous to be on stage and did a fabulous job!
The lights on the stage (and my distance from it) made it hard to get a very good picture.

And, of course, no summer is complete with out tan lines...
(polka dot feet from the holes in the top of his crocs...never thought to sunscreen there!!)
They ride in style!!  G stays in the basket with me and I LOVE having them along!!
And they think going to the grocery store is a treat!!

Good-bye,  Summer 2014!!