Dear Sallie......

Dear Sallie,

Happy 2 1/2 day. I can not believe that you are 2 1/2 years old. You are the smartest, cutest, sweetest little girl I know and you will never know the joy that you bring to me. 2 1/2 years ago I did not know the joy that you would continue to bring into my life. You have made me the proudest Mama ever and I am so thankful for you. Your sweet little voice brightens my life and your pitter patter in the morning over to my side of the bed always makes me smile. You are such a wonderful big sister and Anna is so lucky to have you. You are so helpful with Anna. You have adjusted well to sharing your time with me and Daddy. I am so proud of you for that. You have a mind of your own and if it is on your mind then you are going to do it. You are funny and laugh a lot and you love to sing and dance. You remember crazy things that I did not even know that you heard. You like routine and if you do it once, you think that it is what you are going to do forever. You love your pappy and lovee and do not want to give them up quite yet. You love chocolate hot mints and must have one on the way to school in the morning. You must have a icee at target and have to ride in the car buggy at publix. You love going to the grocery store with me but are not always an angel while there. You like to exercise with me and get "wet" after you are done. This means that you are sweaty. You love school and look forward to going every day. You are always up for a adventure. You are not afraid of a stranger and will talk to anyone. Your new thing is to ask "why" about everything. The "twos" have been hot and cold and I am sure that they will only get hotter and colder but I would not trade a day of your life for anything in this world. I love you so so much..... Mama

Our famous dog, Jack

I know that this blog is about my children however this entry is about Jack, our dog. He is such a wonderful dog that has been through bringing home two new babies to our house and handled it so well. Jack will take any attention that he can get these days (poor dog). I caught Sallie inspecting his ears yesterday and listening to his heart with her doctors kit and the sad thing is that he was letting her because he was getting some attention. Poor Jack used to be my #1 and now he is my number #4. He went everywhere with me and even slept at the end of my bed. Jack is lucky these days to get a Pat but he loves me unconditionally. I need to get better about this and show him more attention. Anna loves Jack as well and laughs when he starts barking or running around the house. Jack is such a good dog and has brought a lot of Joy to my life pre babies and pre marraige. Ward was not really a dog kind pf person before we met and he fell in love with Jack quickly. Jack is now bringing joy to Sallie and Anna even though Sallie is sometimes not so nice to him. We are working on this as well. Jack has recently learned a new trick that I think is pretty cool. He has learned to climb the latter on our play set and then slide down the sliding board. I think that this is pretty incredible. He used to do it going after a ball. Now he likes it so much that he does it on command. I am posting pictures of this. I really want to send it to funniest videos!!! Let me know if you think that we will win.

Hello dairy

Well I took a dirty diaper to the doctor this morning to get tested for milk allergies after giving Anna a bottle of milk based formula yesterday and guess what...It tested negative which means ice cream, cheese, and milk watch out...here I come. I do think that Anna still has a little sensitive stomach and spits up a lot more when I give her formula and when I eat dairy however it is much better than it used to be and so mild that there was no trace of blood in her stool. Just thought I would share the good news. I am going to have a bowl of publix peanut butter lowfat frozen yougurt right now. Anna, you have been worth the wait, but it is time......I am so glad that your little stomach has developed and you have outgrown your allergy.

Well, since my last post was about Christmas I decided it was time to blog about what has been going on since Christmas. We have just been hanging out and enjoying life. We had a little snow last week. Nothing really stuck to the ground however it was enough to call off school. We did get out in it for a little while but there was really nothing to play with. Sallie enjoyed watching it fall. Anna is starting to sit up with support now. She loves her food that she is now eating and always wants more. She is going to be my eater. Sallie never really liked the rice cereal or the baby food and Anna seems to really like it. Anna is still getting up one time in the night/morning but we are trying to break this ASAP. A Lot easier said than done!!! Sallie is continuing to talk up a storm and learn new words and phrases daily!!! She has picked up on saying um a lot when I ask her a question now and she is also starting to shrug her shoulders a lot. These must be things that she picked up from school right? I am trying to ignore them so they don't become a habit. Friday they have a nursery rhyme dress up parade at school as this is what they have been working on for the month of January. Not sure what Sallie is going to dress up as but I will post pics as soon as we have a outfit. We took a trip to the beach last weekend with my parents and had a great time. Anna did not sleep very well but we enjoyed getting away for the weekend. Sallie went bowling for her first time with Ward and really enjoyed it. It was freezing cold but Sallie did go out to the beach in her pjs for a couple of pictures. Ward and I got to go out to dinner and do some shopping kid free Saturday night while my parents kept the kids. That was very enjoyable. Ward's Mom came into town this past weekend and kept Sallie for a little while so that Ward and I could go out to another enjoyable dinner. We are truly blessed to have family to help out. One of the pictures posted is a picture of Anna after Sallie covered her with toys. Anna fell asleep like this. Sallie and Anna continue to be blessings daily and I just thanks God for my healthy and happy girls.

Our Christmas

What a wonderful Christmas we had. This post is very late but I have tried to sit down and post something so many times and have not finished so here it finally is.... Sallie got her motorcycle form Santa that she really wanted and has really had a great time riding it. She also got a scooter form her Nana which she has had a blast riding in circles around the driveway. She got a art easel that was her favorite gift but now has just become a huge mess because she paints her hands and her body and then gets in trouble. Sallie was really excited Christmas morning and loved putting out cookies and milk for Santa. It was pretty funny because Jack, our dog, ate the cookies and drank the milk before we went to bed so we had to replace them. Sallie started getting sick Christmas night and was up all night. She had a fever so we took her to the doctor the next day and they said that she just had a cold virus that was going around. They tested her for the flu but she was in the clear. Her fever finally went away the following day however she never bounced back to her normal happy self. We went out of town for New Years and she started complaining about her ear while we were there. Anna was really fussy as well and not sleeping at all. We were up all night for about 3 nights out of town and finally decided to leave Saturday. We took both girls to doctors care the day after New Years and it turned out that they both had ear infections. Sallie has really struggled with ear infections and has tubes in her ears but still seems to get them. Now Anna has had her first one at 4 months so I hope that this is not the start of many more. They are now recovering on antibiotics and we are finally getting some sleep. Anna is laughing and smiling all the time now. She is really getting to be so interactive. I know that I said this in last post but she really is so much fun now. When I go get her in the morning she just smiles and coos. She loves Sallie and laughs at just about anything that Sallie does. Sallie has been trying to pick Anna up lately so I have really had to watch her closely. Anna is still getting up in the night to eat but right now I am going to choose my battles. That is not one of them. Anna weighs 14 pounds now so she really does not need to be eating in the middle of the night any longer. Just a couple more nights of good sleep and then I will let her cry it out...maybe. Sallie is continuing to talk up a storm and keeps us in stitches with her funny sayings. She woke up yesterday morning and came running in our room telling us that she had birds in her bed. I had no idea what she was talking about and she was pulling me to her room to show them to me. I went in her room and she was right, it sounded like there were birds in her bed. Her sound machine automatically goes to the bird chirping noise when the power goes out. The power went out the other night in that wind storm and reset on the birds chirping. Anyway, It was hilarious. I started feeding Anna rice cereal and Sallie told me "no Mama, she just drinks milk". This is because I use to say this all the time when Sallie would try and put something in Anna's mouth. She does not miss a beat and is too smart for her own good. Sallie is such a loving child. She always wants to make sure that we know that she loves us. When I go somewhere now and come home she tells me that she cried. I ask her why and she tells me it was because she missed me. She really knows how to push my buttons. We had a Christmas break and hated to get back to work. I know that 2009 is going to be a wonderful year. My 2009 goals are to be a better mother, wife, and friend. I want to learn to cook better and read more. I want to worry less and play more. I want to take time for myself more often. My number 1 goal is to pray about everything everyday and grow more in my walk with God. I am so thankful for my life and all that I have been blessed with. Sallie, Anna, and Ward you have made me that happiest Mama and wife around and I hope that 2009 only gets better.

Christmas in Columbia 08

Only 11 days until Christmas and we are counting!!!! We have done lots of fun Christmas activities over the last couple of weeks and Sallie is really getting excited!!! We went from asking Santa for a motorcycle and a scooter for Christmas and to a baby doll today. Wow, what drastic differences. We will see what direction Santa decides to go in. Sallie and Ward went on a train ride with Santa Saturday and we also went to the mall to see Santa a couple of weeks ago. She was not really crazy about Santa at the mall but did sit with Santa on the train ride. Sallie has decorated a gingerbread house and made lots of cute Christmas crafts for our Christmas tree. We all went downtown to the Christmas parade last Saturday with our friends. Sallie has learned that Christmas is Jesus' birthday and Jesus was born in Bethlehem. She is very excited about having cake and blowing out candles on Christmas for Jesus. I guess I need to get to baking. Anyway, our house becomes more active everyday and with Christmas approaching it is full charge. Anna is getting happier and more interactive daily and so much fun to be around. She really is a good baby!!! Sleeping has become more of a nightly routine now and she only gets up once in the night now. We have had to put a gate up at the door in Sallie's room due to her being able to open the door now and due to her getting up at all hours wandering around the house and because she has become quite the mischievous little girl. She is into everything now and I mean everything. She uses Anna's bumbo seat as a step stool to get boost herself up to the cookie jar or the candy. She saw me coming when she was doing this yesterday and managed to unwrap 5 Hersey kisses and put them in her mouth by the time I could get to her. I put her down for a nap last week and was upstairs working. I had the monitor on and never heard anything. About a hour after putting her down I walked downstairs to get something and started smelling something that resembled nail polish remover. I went back to the bedroom and she had gotten into my bathroom cabinets and.......painted her "poenails", sprayed hairspray everywhere including her hair and my bathroom floor, taken my hair straightening oil and dumped all three little bottles on the floor, colored my cabinets with eyeliner, and after that I stopped looking. I was in awe!! I wanted to laugh so badly at the look on her face when I caught her but knew that I could not. She could have gotten into the pack of razors and that would have been bad. I picked her up and placed her very firmly back in her bed. She says that I slammed the door but really I shut it very firmly. Everyone asks if I took pics and sorry I did not. I was too mad at the time. Due to this and her wandering upstairs in the middle of the night, her door is now being gated during nap time. Today is the first day so I will post the results. Our Christmas tree is up and we have really enjoyed decorating our new house. If feels like home and all our Christmas decorations fit so nicely in it. I will post lots of Christmas pictures that I have taken over the last couple of weeks. We had dinner with Ward's brother, Carter, and sister-in-law, Beth, and their new baby tonight. Little Ellis is beautiful and Sallie just loved her. I got a cute shot of the three girls. I will post that picture as well. It is so funny to see how babies from the same family look so different.

Thanksgiving 2008

I am so thankful for my family and we had a great time this Thanksgiving celebrating family. The entire side of my Dad's family came down to the beach. We have not seen some of those family members since Ward and I were married. It was great seeing everyones children and letting them all play. We all had Thanksgiving lunch together and then got to watch the Clemson Carolina game on Saturday. The kids had a blast. Anna got a little off while we were there and did not want to sleep and did not want to be put down. This was a little frustrating but overall it was a great trip. We came home Saturday night and had Sunday to get ready for Christmas. I am looking forward to the upcoming weeks of seeing Christmas everywhere. Sallie seems to really be into Christmas this year as I think this is really the first year that she knows a little about what is going on. I did try and take her to see Santa Claus at the beach and she had no interest and said that she did not want to sit in his lap. he talked to her from afar and she told him that she wanted a motorcycle for Christmas. No babies, no dress up, no princess stuff, but a motorcycle. Go figure!! Anyway, hopefully I will be able to convince her to sit in Santa's lap with Anna. We will see!!