Happy 21-Month Birthday, T and E!!!

Sharing a banana and their Daddy's lap and showing off their post-nap bedheads this morning

Dear Tamsie and Evangelyn,

Somehow I never did a 20-month post, probably due to the sheer busyness of June, but here I am with your 21-month recap!

I promise they were happy, but it was bright outside!

You have finally graduated to size 4 diapers. You are generally in 12-month clothes. However, some of your 12-month PJs are too small, but your new 18-month PJs are still a little big -- so I guess you're really somewhere in between! I'm thinking T weighs around 22 lbs and E is around 21 currently.

Two cars keep the drama to a minimum! Thank you, Grandaddy, for the second car!

Your favorite foods are berries, string cheese, cottage cheese (you can go through a whole container of this stuff in like 3 days tops!), goldfish, cheese bunnies, smoothies, eggs, chicken nuggets, apple sauce, sweet potatoes, carrots... OK, just about everything, I guess, except black-eyed peas! The best part is that you are asking for things by name these days, which really helps us out a lot when we're trying to figure out what you want!

Half the fun is getting out and in again and again....

As E demonstrates here!

You say silly little things all the time. Like a pack 'n' play is a pack 'n' box in your world. Mickey Mouse is often called Stinky Mouse. The book It's Not Easy Being a Bunny is just Easy Bunny to you. And E in particular loves to say "Thank you, baby!" when she gives you something.

T loves to feed everyone real food and play food. When she does, she opens her mouth really big and sticks out her tongue as far as she can. This picture in no way does it justice, but it's the best I could get at the time!

You are starting to make little friends! Both of you love talking about our neighbors Allie and Pierce. We hear about them constantly!

The girls love to help in any way they can these days. Here they are helping their Daddy put up groceries. They're also becoming really good at cleaning up at the end of the day!

You've pretty much mastered your letters and basic numbers, and you often come very close to counting to 20! You are also doing a great job learning your colors! Both of you know several songs, some of which I never even taught you (like "Baa Baa Black Sheep"), so I'm guessing you learned some bonus material at church or Mother's Day Out.

Friday we went to go see our friends Ashley and Cole, who just so happens to be the future husband of his Vafi twin of choice! ;)

You also love to dance! Tamsie will do a little dance on command.

Saturday we took them to a kids' event at a church nearby.  Both of them loved the petting zoo, but Tamsie refused to get too close to any of the animals. Evie, however, LOVED petting them and even fed them too!

Your personalities continue to shine more and more, and they continue to be VERY different! Tamsie tends to be a little less outgoing when around new people, and Evie is definitely the risk-taker of the two! Tamsie is learning to say "Evie's cup" and bring Evie's cup to her before taking her own. However, if one is going to steal from the other, it will be Tamsie every time, and Evie will come crying to us to tell on her sister! Also, it takes a lot to upset Evie, but when she's mad, LOOK OUT!

My monkey girl and her Daddy

Books continue to be the toys of choice around here, and the current favorites are Peter Rabbit and Caps for Sale. You love pointing your fingers and making the little noises the monkeys make in the book!

I wanted a close-up of Tams, and this is the best she gave me!

Both of you make my life considerably easier by keeping to the same schedules. I tell everyone that having twins must be a million times easier than having two at two different stages, because you entertain each other constantly, eat the same amount at the same times, and sleep at the same times. Some afternoons I'll have as much as a 2.5 to 3-hour break during your mutual naptime!

Here's the best close-up I could get from E! She looks so suspicious of the camera, as if she never has her picture taken - ha!

You are still obsessed with the escalators at the mall and start saying "escalator!" any time we drive anywhere in the vicinity of Wolfchase.

Oh so serious

You are speaking in more and more sentences. Of course we (like all parents do with their kids) think you're geniuses. When you do something particularly impressive, we can't help but thank the Lord for how well He has taken care of you, and for the way He continues to do so!

Oh so dangerous

In early September, Tamsie will go for more kidney tests. I can't tell you two how much I hate having this hanging over our heads, and how ready I am to be on the other side of it all. We're still praying that surgery won't be needed!

Silly girls

Of course, the two of you continue to get attention EVERYWHERE you go. I think you always will!

My mom found the deluxe wagon at Bargain Hunt, and the other one was mine that once stayed at my Grandma's house.

You LOVE playing outside!

Have I mentioned how nonstop busy these girls are?

Whenever you two are split up, you ask where the other one is until you're reunited again! You may drive each other crazy sometimes, but you truly do love each other.

I can't tell you how much they bless my life!

Girls, you are so very loved.

4th of July

We have had a most spectacular four-day weekend! Thursday we went over to my Uncle Myron and Aunt Lauren's house for my family's 4th of July celebration. Friday we met our friends and neighbors Rachel, Allie and Pierce at the zoo, where we attempted to completely wear out the girls so that they would sleep well all the way to YaYa's house in Madison, MS. The trip down was quite the success, and we were so excited to see YaYa, Papa Herbie and Uncle Noah! We took the girls back home during naptime the following day, which was a little bit less of a success -- 2 hours of napping followed by an hour that seemed more like 10 hours of grouchy girls who kept saying "GET OUT!" which means "GET US OUT OF THIS CAR NOW!!" Today has been a good old normal Sunday, and now I think we're all refreshed and ready to kick off a new week! Here are some recent pics:

THIS is by far the most highly rated book around our house these days. They want to hear it over and over and over. If they haven't heard it all day, they will often refuse all other books we attempt to read them until they've heard this one. I can't even let them play with it on their own, because they fight over it constantly! Thankfully, the story ends with Peter Rabbit falling asleep, so I often use that as an excuse to remove it from the room entirely when we're done reading it -- "Sorry girls, Peter has gone to sleep. Remember?"

Actually, when I tell them that, this is the kind of reaction I get. 

SO MAD!
(This is Tamsie.)
(By the way, in case you're wondering why I would ever dream of taking a picture of my girl at a time like this, it's because her facial expression here very much reminds me of one Jennifer W. and I used to make back in the day that became a classic inside joke with us. When I saw T displaying this face, I immediately had to text her a picture!)

Evie's quite the little lady. Here she is playing with her plastic lipstick that came with her toy purse.

T is very proud of the red, white and blue mess she has made!

OK, so she had a little help.

At Myron and Lauren's, T entertained herself by getting in and out of this box all the toys were in. When she was inside, it probably reminded her of happy times in her pack 'n' play, which she and her sister like to refer as the "pack 'n' box."

Just enjoying a nice sisterly chat.
By the way, they had their first actual conversation today (that we've noticed). It went something like this:
T: More milk!
E: No milk.
T: OK.
I'm sure it won't be long before they're discussing the particulars of nuclear physics and exegeting Pauline letters.

But for now, they sometimes need help getting up and down steps.

Twinnies. The only way I got E to wear a white bow for the 4th was to remove the yellow one from the table. She was only able to choose from a collection of white bows. :)

E really didn't want to sit still for this one. That's not a happy face, but a face of grudging obedience.

Model T

OK, I couldn't stop taking pictures of them!

Chasing after Daddy

Chasing after Sissy

Sitting in a chair like a big girl

In Mississippi, we went out to eat at a fabulous pizza restaurant! As usual, the girls particularly enjoyed licking every sprinkle of parmesan cheese off their plates.

None was wasted, if T could help it!

Saturday morning was spent in the pool at YaYa's. E's on the left, and I can't vouch for whatever T's doing.

The next set of pictures were taken by Mrs. DeeDee. I don't know how I missed getting any pics of the girls with her!! :( Here is Chris with Tamsie, and I'm holding Evie (yellow bow alert, of course!).

Once again, Model T

My sweet E. She currently loves saying, "Guess what?! I love you SOOOO much!" -- which she of course picked up from yours truly.

By the way, Happy 36th Anniversary today, parents!! I'm continually blessed by your amazing example.
Guess what? I love you SOOOO much! :)

Since I still have 27 of my 30 for 30 left to cover {and I totally just realized I subconsciously stole the phrase "30 for 30" from the set of ESPN documentaries Chris watches on Netflix every chance he gets... HAHAoops!}, I'll close out with the next one on my list:

4. Love genuinely, and never be afraid of loving too much. You only regret when you didn't love someone enough. This really is based on Romans 12 (which happens to be one of my favorite chapters in the Bible), which says in verses 9 and 10: "Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves." For example, I know sometimes in the moment I'll feel silly reaching out to someone I don't know very well to let them know that I am praying for them about something they're going through, but really the only times I've regretted something like that are the times when I didn't reach out and I should have. I heard from all sorts of people I hadn't heard from in ages back when the girls had just been born and things were all going crazy in our lives, and it just meant the world to me to know we were being prayed for by all these people and that they took the time out of their busy days to let me know. So often a word of encouragement or affirmation can go a very long way!

30 for 30: 1-3

OK, in the last post I probably led you to believe that there would be no 30 life lessons coming from me on my blog in honor of my 30th year. Well, through some mysterious process, the notion planted itself in my noggin and actually wound up sounding like a bit of a fun challenge, so I think I'm going to impart 30 life lessons after all. You'll also see random pictures from my phone, because, as always, I'm not sure what else to do with them! :)

The girls love pulling all the pillows off the couch and the big chair and rolling all around on top of them.

You know I do love a good blog series.

T's face here is what makes the picture.

Maybe it's also that I suddenly feel like a full-fledged 30-year-old, thanks to a random injury I sustained last week. Y'all, it appears that my body is finally showing its age. Two Sundays ago, my arm hurt, and then it hurt and hurt and hurt until this past Friday I could hardly lift the thing, so Saturday I made the trek to Campbell Clinic to get checked out. One cortisone shot later, with one physical therapy appointment and another follow-up appointment on the horizon, I am happy to say I feel like a new woman! Here's to getting my 30-year-old rotator cuff inflammations out of the way early on, and here's to using my arm to its full potential once again! :)

Watching Sesame Street

And since I've reached the point in life where I can inflame a rotator cuff and not even know it, surely I have something decent to say for myself, right? Maybe not, but I'm hoping something I say here will be of some value to someone who stumbles across it. I'm sure much of it will be pure cheese but maybe something will be beneficial.

OK, let's get started!

Who needs one of those fancy book nooks you see on Pinterest when you can share a pillow with your sissy and improvise your own?

1. Seek God's Kingdom first (see Matt. 6:33). This one is totally not original, but then again I highly doubt any of these are! :) And in this case, I'm not sure you want to be too original.

If you go back to Matthew 6 and read what's said right before Jesus issues the advice to "seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness," you'll see that he's talking about the fruitlessness of getting all worried and anxious about things like clothes, food, you know, the things you have to have to live. The things you can actually be the most tempted to worry about. Then he says that if you seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, then all these things will be added to you -- which means that they have a way of sorting themselves out. If you focus on God and the things God cares about, He will take care of the rest.

So seek His Kingdom first, no matter where that takes you, no matter what that looks like for you. No matter what, it will be worth it, and "all these things will be added to you." Of course, that doesn't mean that life's going to turn out delightful always, but that does give you good cause to remember to adopt the truth of verse 34 as your own: "Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble."

Now to learn to live that out even when it's not easy...

Hearing them "read" their books is always a favorite of mine. It's amazing what they absorb just from listening to me read to them.

2. Don't be afraid to shine like a star. Philippians 2 talks about "shining like stars in the sky" while living a "blameless and pure" life as "children of God ... in a warped and crooked generation." I have seen that if you have convictions and stand by them, sure, you'll get some flack for it -- but more often than not, people will also respect you for it. And of course, you should never let people's respect be a motivator, but I have found this to be shockingly true over and over again.

Life with a man: I see Chris has found my Vera Bradley clips and is using them to keep bags of veggies nice and tidy in the fridge. I'll bet he probably didn't even notice how cute they are when he pulled them out of the drawer.

3. Be suspicious of anyone who discourages you from being smart. Growing up, thanks to being in APEX and whatever else for advanced kids from the beginning, I felt like I always had a reputation as "that smart, quiet girl," and I despised it. Don't get me wrong -- I enjoyed learning then as I do now, but I didn't particularly want that to be the first thing people thought of when they thought of me. And I LOATHED being thought of as "quiet." Not that I wanted to be loud, but I mean who wants to be known as the smart, quiet girl? Really? Hello, boring! Ugh, I was so self-conscious of that!

In 7th grade I accidentally wound up qualifying for a school-wide spelling bee, and I was just beyond mortified that I had done so. On the day of the spelling bee, I stood in front of a cafeteria packed with my bored, listless, way cooler peers, and suddenly I just felt like I was doing nothing but solidifying my ho-hum reputation in their eyes. I couldn't take it anymore. When my turn came around, I misspelled "avalanche" intentionally -- just so I could get out from under their stares, just so I wouldn't look like some kind of know-it-all girl who was actually very smart. When I went home that day, I told my mom what I had done, and I wound up feeling overwhelmed with guilt. Slowly it sank in that I should never, ever be ashamed to be a smart girl. In fact, I should embrace it!

As I became older and saw the way girls who at least pretend to be dumb are embraced in our shallow culture, it hit me one day: I should always be suspicious of anyone who doesn't want me to be smart. Why wouldn't I want to be smart? Nowadays, if you tell me I'm smart, I'll take it as an extreme compliment! Smart = awesome!!

So while I have come to embrace and encourage the smart, I really don't know that I'm all that quiet anymore, and I'm happy about that. I'm still an introvert at heart, but I've learned not to worry so much about what others think of me, and that has freed me up to be more outgoing over the years. More on that later!

Maybe I'll cover some more life lessons next time. I do have a Pages document ready with 30 of them! :)

30

Saturday I entered a whole new decade! I wish I had 30 wise life lessons to impart to you, or something like that, since I think I always expected to be 99% wiser than I likely am by the time I hit 30, but alas. I don't have much time to post today, so a picture recap will have to suffice. 

Melissa (who took this picture) set up a lovely birthday tea for me at Chez Phillipe! It was the perfect way to celebrate turning 30 (or any other age, for that matter!), and we had a wonderful time. I feel like I should tell you that there is a good reason for my hair's utter frumpiness: it was an insanely hectic morning leading up to the tea. I had several errands to run, and it's kind of a wonder I didn't wind up wearing sweats up there, as crazy as it all was!

For my birthday gift from Chris, I ordered this rug for our living room. (You know you must be 30 when you choose to order a rug for your birthday.) However, when it came in, it was abundantly clear it did NOT match our living room decor. I tried and tried and tried to love it, but it just wasn't happening for me.

While I felt like I was cheating on my new rug, I talked Chris into running me to Target ("just to look around," you know), and I wound up finding this one instead -- for a much better price! It just matches everything in our room WAY better. Now, sadly, we are left with the rug above, because we bought it at a final-sale price and so it is non-returnable, so if it happens to be the perfect rug for you, just let me know! We'd LOVE to sell it ASAP!

While I was having tea and scones and other wondrous delectables at the Peabody, the girls were hanging out with their Daddy and Granddaddy enjoying the hot summer day from the comfort of their new pool!

Swimsuit babies and their Daddy on Sunday afternoon

Getting her SPF on, while hanging onto her wagon

Evie ripped off her sunglasses the second I put them on her, but Glamour Tams left hers on the whole time.

T's selfie. She thinks this picture is the funniest thing ever, and she laughs hysterically whenever I show it to her.

T found my shoes and kept saying, "Walk! Walk! Walk!" 

Giggly girls

DADDY'S HOME!!

E models her new big-girl PJs

My lil sis Beth from my sorority days who has truly become like a little sister to me sent me this sweet gift in the mail. It's a journal that she has filled with quotes about friendship.

She's been working on this for me ever since the day I lost my Grandma. Her friendship is such an incredible blessing in my life!

Carissa also managed to find the perfect card to sum up our friendship! I am so richly blessed to have such dear friends.

I haven't shared any videos in a while, because it's not the easiest thing to do on Blogger -- but I thought these were well worth it! :)

Here's Evangelyn and her Daddy having fun in her pool:

Here are the girls with their Daddy right when he came home from work one day this past week. He gets a royal welcome every time!

Evangelyn's interpretation of Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus:

{ARGH, it's not letting me upload it. I'll try it on a separate post.)

Tamsie's interpretation of Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus:

And last but not least, Tamsie's rendition of Baby Faces: