Beach 2009

We are still at the beach however thought that I have a lot more time here, than I do at home, to blog. We came to the beach Saturday and will be here until Saturday. We are having lots of fun and the weather has been beautiful. Our trip started out kind of rocky however as of Monday we have been busy enjoying the beach and the boat. Anna got a fever bug Fri and it did not go away until Mon. We had to go to doctors care two times as the fever got kind of high and was not going away. We did a lot of Tylenol, Motrin, and Popsicles. Thank goodness my parents were here until Monday to help out with Sallie. Sallie is still a little fish and has no inhibitions about the water. Thank goodness we will start swimming lessons on Mon as she is making me a nervous wreck. She will go straight into the waves without looking back. Anna on the other hand is not crazy about anything on the beach but the sand. She has been eating sand by the handfuls. She has also been depositing the sand by the diaper fulls. We went to Broadway at the beach and played putt putt which Sallie loved. We then went to build a bear and built a beach lamb. It is pretty cute. Sallie loved making it but now could careless about it. It was a really fun experience for anyone that has never done it. I never really knew what it was but have wanted to go. We have been out for dinner a lot and Sallie told me last night that she loves going to restaurants. Everytime we leave to go somewhere and then head back home she asks if we are going to the beach house or Columbia. I think that she is going to be sad when we really head back for Columbia. We have been taking lots of "cart rides" as well and found a path where we can take cart rides to the ice cream store. We went in a really big candy store today at the hammock shops and got to pick candy out of barrels. Not sure who really enjoyed this more....me or Sallie? I snuck some of her candy. It has been a wonderful week and we have really enjoyed it. Ward took Sallie fishing and she got to reel in a little fish all by herself as she would tell you. She then let it go back to his mommy. We have gotten lots of pictures as this is really Anna's first time on the beach. She looks pretty darn cute in her swimsuit, I must say......I was looking back as pictures from our beach trip over the last couple of Memorial days as this is usally when we take our week vacation. Amazing at how much Sallie and Anna look alike at this stage. I did not notice how much until I looked at these pictures.

Watch out, Anna is crawling

Anna started crawling tonight. I had her on the floor while I was straightening up the bedroom and getting on my pjs. A few minutes later I heard her babbling in the hallway and thought that Ward had come in our room and gotten her. I looked over my shoulder and she was in the hallway all by herself. I ran, got the camera, some keys, and tried to get her to come to the keys...she loves keys. She did it on cue and we got some cute pictures of her first couple of crawls. It is pretty cute. I know that this excitement about crawling will be short lived especially in the morning when I am trying to get ready for work and Anna is in the bathroom trying to pull up on the toilet but it was cute tonight and she was very proud of herself. She started eating some real people food this week as well. She has been eating peas and carrots really well and she loves yo baby yogurt. She does not have any teeth yet and the doctor says that she does not see any in sight. I guess that Anna will be late getting teeth like Sallie. We had my niece and nephew spend the night this past weekend. We had a fun slumber party with pizza and movies. It was a lot of fun and they all enjoyed it. I do put mothers with 4 children, 5 years old and younger on a pedestal now. It was hard work!!! It was my sister's birthday though and they had a nice night out. We are gearing up for our week long beach trip starting Saturday. Sallie is so excited and has all kind of plans for her vacation. This will be the first time that Anna will actually go on the beach. We have been there two times but it was too cold both trips to go out on the beach. WE are looking forward to some family down time. Sallie was "working out" with me today and lifting "bones" as she calls my weights. She put the weights down and I was lifting a weight and she walked behind me and the weight hit her face right under her eye. So....if you see Sallie with the black eye, please don't ask questions. I feel awful. Anyway, will post lots of pics from our beach trip when we get back and have posted some pics of Anna's latest 9 month adventures...crawling, food, and slumber parties.

The Best Mother's Day 2009

I had the best Mother's Day yet and we celebrated all weekend long. For Mother's Day Ward got me a appointment at my favorite hair place in Greer, SC to get a cut and color. We went to Anderson to spend the night with Ward's Mom Fri night and got to go out to a nice Dinner while Nana kept the kids. I left early Saturday kid free to get my hair done. We came back to Columbia Saturday afternoon and had a cookout with my Mom and family. Sunday we all went to church and then off to the lake for a boat ride. It was a wonderful weekend. Sallie and Anna made me a precious platter for Mother's Day and I will post a picture of it. I love it!!! The kids made their Nana a apron and their Peppy a little tote bag with their hands and paint. I will post pictures of their artistic abilities. I tell you what, the painting part of these gifts almost sent me over the edge with Sallie. She just wanted to paint everywhere and pour paint in bowls and she painted some on the carpet on the porch. We put the paint away for a while. I am so thankful for my precious girls and they made my Mother's Day so special. I am also so thankful for my Mom who made "me" possible. She has taught me so much and continues to teach me things everyday even when I don't want to listen. I am thankful for Ward's Mom who made him a wonderful husband and father. I am so thankful for my sister who is a wonderful Mother and has taught me the ropes of motherhood. Motherhood is flying by and I want it to slow down. It seems like my very first Mother's Day was just yesterday.

Watch our Peppy on WISTV

The link below is my Mom, the kids' Peppy, on the news this week for her work with a child that is getting a cochlear implant. She did such a great job and we are so proud of her. What a amazing part she gets to play in this child's life...helping him to process new noises as he learns to hear. Hope this link works. Enjoy

http://www.wistv.com/global/category.asp?c=151146&clipId=&topVideoCatNo=3851&topVideoCatNoB=67010&topVideoCatNoC=125643&topVideoCatNoD=87934&topVideoCatNoE=138849&autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=3723484

Sallie has really enjoyed playing t- ball so I am posting some pictures of her playing last week. She is actually really good at it. Anna enjoys sitting back and watching it all. Sallie has a busy summer planned for her. I just signed her up for swimming lessons and for ballet. I am excited about watching it all.

Igot some pictures of Sallie but have not uploaded them yet however Sallie has decided that she wants to sleep with no clothes on all of a sudden. I have no idea where this came from but she fights me everynight on this so I decided to let her just go to bed with just a pull up on. She says that she wants to get cozy with her blanket. If I make her put her pjs on she takes them off as soon as I leave her room. This is all new so we will see where this goes. Sallie and her cousin Ella are playing doctor together in this last picture. They were very quiet for a while so I walked back in Sallie's room and this is what I saw. It was pretty funny!

The Easter Bunny came

We had a wonderful Easter weekend. It was a really busy but lots of fun. We went to Beaufort on Friday to spend the night with Ward's Dad and family. We had a great time. We got to spend some time with our niece, Ellis, and she and Anna had a ball playing on the floor together. Sallie loved playing with Addie and got to take a boat ride with Grandaddy. We came back late Saturday night and woke up here at home Easter morning, went to church, had a great lunch and then naps. Our church service was amazing and packed and by nap time the girls were all tuckered out. The girls were out of school all last week for Spring break and I was very happy for Tuesday when they started back. Trying to juggle school schedules and work schedules was hard. I am posting some pictures of the weekend and Easter morning.

On another note, Anna is now sleeping in her pack and play upstairs in our playroom. We have decided that we have got to get some sleep and can not be waking up radomly through the night with her cryinhg. It has really been great. As far as we can hear, she has been sleeping through the night. Just kidding. I do have a monitor and she does wake up occassionally but i just let her cry. It has gotten much better and she only wakes up crying every now and then. I feel really bad by letting her cry but know that she is fine and this is best for her. Ward and I have got to get some sleep before we loose our minds. Anna started clapping yesterday and it is so cute. She is really starting to do those fun things that I remember Sallie doing. She is not crawling yet but it won't be long. She is trying. Can not beleive that my baby is 8 months now. I know that I say it all the time but she is really just growing up to quick. Sallie told me yesterday that she can not wait until Anna can walk. They are going to have so much fun together.

Easter is Coming

It has been a while since last post as I tend to get more behind now then before. I have been really busy with work lately. I feel like it has been so time consuming lately and I could not put my finger on the reason why. Turns out, I have been working a lot and I guess my expectations for myself have been really high over the last month. Turns out, I was the top producer in Columbia for this quarter working only 30 hours per week versus my co workers working 40 hours per week. I won a competition and my prize...a new ipod. Anyway, I was very excited but am going to slow down now!!! I have been stressed and now it is time for me to enjoy Spring Break with the my girls and especially Easter. I sure hope that my boss is not reading this :) Enough about me...we are really excited about Easter and Spring approaching. I love the warm weather and we have spent a lot of time outside lately. Anna is growing like a weed and saying a lot lately. It is all babble but a lot of it. She is pretty close to saying Da Da and of course Ma Ma has never been said. We have been working hard on it though. Sallie has been a talker for a long time now but she is getting a much bigger vocabulary. She was talking on the phone to Ward while he was out of town last weekend and was asking where he was and then paused and said "anyways, Mama wants to talk to you now." I was dying laughing. I guess this means that I say "anyways" on the phone a little too much. Sallie has been busy at school preparing for Easter. The Easter bunny came to their class and they had a Easter party. They have been learning about Jesus and the reason that we celebrate Easter. We dyed Easter eggs last week and have been on many Easter egg hunts. We are celebrating Easter here in Columbia this year and are looking forward to it. We are really looking forward to the summer, going to the beach, taking the boat out, and just hanging in the sun. Sallie got enrolled in the summer program where she attends school but Anna did not get in as her class was too full for the summer. Not sure what we are going to do with Anna this summer but are actively looking. With Easter approaching and all the new beautiful blooms on our trees and flowers in our yard, it makes me reflect on the beauty of our world and the blessings all around. I Hope that everyone has a Happy Easter.

We celebrated with McRea on Saturday for her first birthday. I can not believe that she is a year old. We had a great time at her birthday party. Happy Birthday baby Crea!! This also means that Anna's birthday is not too far away. How is my baby close to a year old? Here is a picture of McRea when she was born April 10th 2008 and here is a picture of her on her 1st birthday in her birthday Tutu

Our May is already looking really busy! We have lots of birthdays to celebrate in May, Mother's Day, and we are also finally getting Anna Baptized. We have been waiting to get her Baptized because we have been in limbo with churches. We are members of a church but seeking something a little smaller and searching for that church where we felt we were being called to serve in some way. We have been visiting a church for almost a year now and love it just were not sure if this was where God wanted us. We have felt in the last couple of weeks that we could very easily fill a place in this church so we are joining in the next couple of weeks and getting Anna baptized sometime in May. We are so excited and can't wait to see where God calls us to serve at Forest Lake Presbyterian Church. We will keep you posted!!!

Tea parties, boat trips and more

Sallie has really gotten into having tea parties lately so I decided to post a couple pictures of our tea party last week. Sallie's tea parties always consist of diet coke. She never wants to pretend or use water. Her baby got to sit in on this tea party!! Won't be long before she and Anna will be having tea parties together.

We took Anna on her first boat ride this weekend and had a great time. The weather was beautiful and it was really warm. We only expected to be out there for about 1 hour or less and did not pack the sunscreen. Anna fell asleep within the first 20 minutes of our ride and we covered her up with shirts and sweaters however her little hands were hanging out of the side of the covered area and got a little sun burnt. It has not seemed to bother her. I felt horrible. Anna slept on the boat for about 2 hours. I guess we know the secret for a good nap. Sallie had a blast as always and really wanted to get in the water but it was freezing. We are looking forward to the summer already!!

I was looking through my pictures the other day and came upon some boat ride pictures of Sallie. I found some of almost this same time last year and nearly cried!! Sallie looks like such a baby compared to now. This was only a year ago and wow she has really grown up. Thought I would post. My girls are growing!!!!

I got some cute shots of Anna the other night after bath so I will post those as well. She is in that cute stage of grabbing her feet now. I remember Sallie getting her picture taken at this stage and love those pictures!!