Friday, February 25, 2011

How She Spent Her Birthday

She started celebrating the day before with my mom. Mema was out of town on her actual birthday so she took her the day before and spent the entire day doing what she wanted to do. Playing, McDonald's, Toys R' Us, and Gigi's cupcakes.

She actually had to be woken up on her Birthday. Gavin wanted to see her open her presents and so did Daddy. She NEVER sleeps past 6:30, but did on her birthday. She woke up to open presents and then eat her birthday donut.


Then a few pictures with Mommy.

Then off to Build A Bear to meet Daddy.


Then lunch of her choice- Chick Fil A.

Then home to make cupcakes and a princess cake with Mommy.

Then off on her new bike. She took a spin around the hood.

Then family and a few friends joined us for fajitas.

I'd say this little three year old had a GREAT Birthday!!

Sunday, February 20, 2011

Hadley Faith

Hadley Faith Turned THREE on Friday. I still can't believe my baby is three years old. I love this little girl so much. She is the complete opposite of our other two. She is VERY STRONG WILLED. She is her own girl. She is very demanding, and likes things her way. But she is the spark plug of the family and she is fun! She makes our family complete and we can't imagine life without her.
She loves to dance and Love, Love, Loves to SING. She amazes us as we flip through the radio and she can sing almost every song. And she constantly wants music on at all times. She can operate the ipad and iphone with ease and constantly is playing music through them.
She loves to dress up. She has a favorite dress-up dress that is purple that she would wear every day if I would let her. I usually hide it every few days so it can have a break and get cleaned.
Her absolute favorite color is PURPLE. If given a color choice of anything, it will always be purple.
She loves her big brother and sister. She has recently found a love of Gavin's wrestling ring. She even knows their names. I hear her ask for Kofe Kingston or John Cena and it makes me laugh. And she loves to wear the wrestling mask and jump around like Gavin. She wants to be just like Ellie and loves to do and try whatever she is doing. She is not in cheer or tumbling yet, but she has a back bend down and can do a handstand to a back bend. This was learned all on her own by watching her big sister. And she learns all the cheers too. This kid is really coordinated. I must get her in an activity soon. She is sad when Ellie is at school and she is not. Next year with Ellie in school full time will be a BIG adjustment.
She loves accessories. Make up, cell phones, purses, lipstick- the girl could never have too many. And sunglasses, she loves her some sunglasses but refuses to wear them correctly, they are always worn upside down. And sometimes she even wears them to bed.
She loves baby dolls. She especially loves her bitty baby who she named Emmy Caroline. Loves to dress her up and change her diaper.
She has mastered the word "NO" and we are still trying to figure out how to discipline her. She is different from the others, and spankings definitely don't phase her. And we can never get her to stay in time outs. We can sometimes threaten to take her beloved B.B away (her blankie). That sometimes works.
She makes us laugh daily with the things she says, or does. She loves to be a little comedian and entertainer. She loves to be the center of attention.
And she has a soft heart, a compassionate heart. I will never ever forget when I came home from the hospital and I was laying in our bed and Frank had told the kids to not come in the room. And she snuck in anyway. She VERY CAREFULLY crawled in bed with me, snuggled up quietly beside me and stroked my bandages and kept whispering, "I hope you feel better Mommy." And she would gently kiss my head.
I love her with all of my heart. I am so blessed that God gave me this true little Miracle that by science shouldn't be here. I know God has big big plans for her in this crazy world. Still can't believe she is three. Three years ago we welcomed her into our family and I remember the day like yesterday. Although remembering our family without her is hard to do. Happy third birthday to my little Mama. I hope all of your dreams and wishes always come true!

Two Years

Two Years exactly is what I lost. TWO YEARS. Two years of videos and pictures of my kiddos. I didn't back up any. Didn't print any. Luckily for me I have a blog that has all my favorite photos of the last two years backed to picassa. I think that is the only reason I didn't have a complete meltdown. I started to upgrade my computer to snow leopard so I could download ilife. And bam- corrupt files were found and my hard drive crashed. Immediately took it to Apple who had me go buy an external hard drive. They tried for five days to fix it and finally called yesterday to say my computer was ready but they had to put a new hard drive in. Nothing was saved. So, I am sending my old hard drive off to some place in California that will hopefully be able to salvage something for me. But I am sure it will be a pretty penny. Sometimes I really hate technology.

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Remodeling.

After a total of 4.5 weeks, we are almost done!! One week before Christmas and the last 3.5 weeks and we have some home improvements marked off the list. We had a very talented friend who we hired to do the work. And man was he amazing! I had seen his work before so I knew he was good, but to watch him every day was pretty remarkable to watch!! Thank you Mr. Marler!!! If anyone is needing a good contractor to do work, let me know and I will send you his number! You won't be disappointed!

We had our kitchen back splash replaced, floors in the kitchen replaced, cabinets painted and distressed, and legs added to the island.

BEFORE:

And AFTER:

BEFORE:

And AFTER:

We also had our long mantel cut in half and an entertainment center built around our new television. To watch him do this from pieces of wood was very impressive. It took us awhile to decide on a color to paint it, but after much deliberating and advice from others, we went with distressed black like the kitchen. And we LOVE it. We also had the tile taken off of our fireplace and a hearth built with stacked stone. It isn't all the way finished yet, but it's almost there. We love this too!! We keep saying, "We can't believe we didn't do all of this years ago."

BEFORE:

AFTER:

BEFORE:

AND AFTER:

There are a few more things we want to do. Take down the pot rack and add some chandeliers, but we haven't figured out what we want for sure yet. I am a horrible decision maker so it's amazing we got all this done. :)

We love our neighborhood. Love our neighbors. And LOVE our school. Every time we think of moving, when it comes down to it, it is hard to leave our little bubble. So I am thinking with our recent improvements we will stay put awhile. Although, the neighbors are all placing bets on how long we'll stay so I guess we'll have to prove them wrong. Time will tell....

Monday, February 07, 2011

Monet and Christi's Birthday

We always have a girls night for our friends birthdays. For Christi's this year we decided to do something different. She invited us all to Painting with a Twist. And we had SO. MUCH. FUN. A room full of 40 people painted the same picture while an instructor went step by step over what to do. We were allowed to bring our own beverages and snacks. What a great concept, right?!? Wine and painting go great together!! Everyone was having such a fun time and it was so neat to see how different our paintings all looked. And it was nice to have a girls night out. I think we'll be doing some more painting parties in the future!!