{the first one to go....}

The night before Christmas Eve... babygirl wasn't quite herself. A little more quiet than normal. We had been at my mom's celebrating Christmas and I just thought it was strange she was so quiet, but chalked it up to her being tired. We got home late, the girls fell asleep in the car. But, D woke up when I put her to bed. We agreed she could come lay with me in our bed. Something we don't like to try to form a habit of... (but they are only little once, and I secretly love to feel the fall asleep on my arm.) She tossed and turned... and finally blurted out in my ear in a tiny whisper.. I think my tooth is gone. WHAT? That was my initial reaction! I had just asked her at lunch how that tooth was hanging in and she showed me that it was obviously loose but ok... so I thought.



Funny thing is we still don't know what happened to that tooth. She said she bit into a deviled egg that night and it got really loose. (I believe that she swallowed it.) She insists that she DID NOT.

i love....

♥ I love the little person she is.
Even when she is stubborn.
I love that she picked out this outfit to wear to school "because its cute"...

and... i told y'all my girls hate shoes!

{birthday week}

Birthday's are a big deal around here... most of you have probably already figured that out. We don't just celebrate one day - we celebrate a week! Growing up, especially since my birthday is *so close* to Christmas each one was always extra special and not to be mixed up with Christmas. To this day- my parents still go above and beyond to not let it blend in with holiday happenings. So I decided that my girls would have their special week as well.

Last week was all for babygirl.

Cake number one... With our "Tuesday night family" at Sportspage. My mother-in-law opened the restaurant when Delaney was just starting to walk. It's just another playroom for my girls so if ever they run circles around your table while your eating, I'm sorry. Please try to ignore them.. it feels like home to them. :)


Her actual birthday was on Thursday. My phone had been ringing all day for her. It was hilarious to me because every time it did she would ask if it was "one of her people" -- and it almost always was!

She had been asking for a few weeks now to go to Chuck-e-cheese. So we thought that her birthday would be a great time. We allowed her to take one friend, Kendall. I don't have many pictures from that experience. Even with all my patience that place makes me NERVOUS! But, the girls had a wonderful time... even baby sissy! She likes to just run around and put her tokens in, she could care less about the games! We also opted not to eat there, but to hit up Pizza Hut instead.



She was counting down to her "Hello Kitty" party day. Here are a few photos from that day at the park.

D is so expressive. I love it! She had to wear her pink and blue hair.

She loaded up on arts and crafts, which is another way she expresses herself. I love that she is so creative!













...and last but not least we wrap up a party at Granny's house. It's not a birthday until you've had your cake of choice baked by Granny!!



We are so blessed with such wonderful friends and family. You all mean so much to us. It is my prayer that as Delaney grows that she realizes how blessed her childhood is and that she is surrounded with people that love her.

{five}

Today she is five.



Five years ago she arrived at 4:29 a.m. Her 6lb 12oz curled up little body fit perfectly into our arms. Our world for a split second, just stopped turning. She was perfect and beautiful. She was an answer to prayer. She is loved.



Her smile makes me smile.



Everyday of her life, she is a blessing.



She's smart and so full of life. She's stubborn, too. She amazes me every single day.



Today she loves:
♥ Barbie dolls
♥ Arts and crafts
♥ dancing
♥ to hear her baby sister laugh
♥ to help others
♥ iCarly
♥ riding her bike
♥ ice cream
♥ to play splaster
♥ school
♥ fuzzy socks
♥ to swing
♥ ice cream!
♥ music
♥ taylor swift kenny chesney miley cyrus
♥ hello kitty
♥ skirts
♥ to cuddle at bedtime

So proud to be 5.


This number five has been hard for me to grasp. Its so full of emotion. But, today I haven't cried. Yesterday... I did.

Babygirl-
You are our heart. You are such an amazing little girl and we love to watch you grow. Your independent and a girl who knows what she wants. That makes it hard on your parents sometimes - that strong will of yours. Your sweet and tender heart shows love. Your laugh fills our home with happiness. Everyday we are thankful.

xoxo,
Mama

{one:::fifty two}

I have decided this year to give project 52 another shot this year. I tried once before, with 52 weeks - my kids and me, but I failed that project. Last year, I tried 365 of my girls...and failed again. So, this year I'm not setting any limits... everything is fair game... my girls, my husband, self portraits or just a photo I'd like to share. I feel that without setting 'rules'... I can be successful... and I know I can handle one photo a week. :)

This is actually last week's shot. I will post 2/52 by Sunday. Up until this morning I was unsure where I wanted to post this series.




She's so close to her fifth birthday. I don't like the idea. I'm having a harder time with five than with one! She's the most beautiful little person.

She told me this morning on the way to school... "Mama, I don't want to ever grow up... but I keep growing overnight." To which I replied "Mama doesn't want you to grow up either!"

Do you think she's been hearing lots of comment on her latest growth spurt?

{babygirl:: K-4}

Monday marked the first day of babygirl's last year of pre-school. I had no anxiety of this "first day" because she's been going there for the past year. I even kept her enrolled all summer to not disrupt the routine she had been accustomed to. Don't worry, it was only three days (half days) and we still had plenty of time to do fun things. She really enjoys it anyway!

So our only adjustment this past week has been that she's a student for five (half) days! Yes, you all that know me well are laughing right now knowing that we no longer have a week day to sleep in... and what an adjustment that has been!!!

My sweet girl obviously had no fears!


She woke up bright eyed. I flipped back the covers to discover that she had colored her legs with blue marker after we put her to bed the night before. I wasn't surprised, and went to scrubbing. After washing one leg I thought.. what are you doing? Go get the camera! :)



We went to get dressed and she quickly informed me she wasn't wearing the outfit on her door, she was wearing this one.....



I pick my battles around here, and she picked a matching outfit. I love her independence anyway.. most of the time! We had a little fun, and babygirl requested this photo before we left... our infamous funny faces!



The morning was somewhat smooth. I had a proud mommy moment when she ran right in and hugged some friends she hadn't seen over the summer. The amount of students has increased at her school this year so it was quite hectic... so I didn't get any inside photos of her first day this year. She was happy to tell me all about her day at pick up time. It's so cute to hear the details she describes. She said that one little boy cried for his mama, and one little girl did too, she said that she was happy Madison was back, and she did the hokey pokey, and that she was upset because she wasn't in the other Delaney's circle at circle time... and quickly asked if we could get a Happy Meal on the way home!

This is what bedtime looked like... one tired little girl!

{wordless wednesday}

{can i run and hide?}

I'm having one of those mommy moments.
(Chime in here and tell me you have them, too!)

i'm blessed that my children are very rarely sick aside from the common cold or "bug" going around
so when I collapsed into bed last night I really hoped (i prayed!) that this morning would be better than our night
it wasn't
you see, Delaney has landed herself a urinary tract infection.
poor baby
so that explains her irritability, the mysterious fever last week, and the nightly accidents
(i mean i think her sheets may fall apart from washing them so much- thank goodness for plastic mattress covers)

so back to yesterday.
enough was enough. another accident. another load of laundry.
i called the dr. and I wasn't going to let them tell me that we weren't coming in.
i was 99% sure it was a uti.
we've done this once before.
thankfully, they wanted a sample.
so i throw our things together
jump in the shower
load them up and we're off

i didn't have time to find a sitter for avery
and she needs a nap
proves to be a disaster
load delaney up with fluids
and halfway there she declares she needs to "go" and bad
i talk her through it
the better thing about it this time is she's potty trained and she can 'tinkle' (as my grandmother would say) in the cup
she does her thing
we wait for the dr.
in the meantime I'm sure the office thought our room contained a bunch of caged animals.
the girls fought over who was going to sit in my lap
i must have said no no a million times to keep avery off the scales
the diagnosis is just as i thought
a uti and antibiotics for 10 days.

the problem now...
the medicine tastes bad and its not pink
it took 30 minutes last night to give her one dose
this morning even worse
after wrestling with her like a pro wrestler
she spit it back out
exhausted, we were both in tears
she just won't take it
she won't drink it mixed with ANYTHING
she doesn't care that i tell her she'll be getting shots if she doesn't just take the medicine
she doesn't seem to care that she's not out playing with the neighborhood kids right now because she won't simply just take the medicine
she's a strong willed four and a half year old
i'm all out of ideas
i'm tired
and I just want her to feel better!

and for the sake of my sanity, why can't they make grape or bubblegum flavored antibiotics?!

{dance dance dance}

It's that time of year again for my little girl to get up on a huge stage with all of her other pretty, little friends and strut her stuff. The months September to May just seems to fly by! As we were preparing last week for the recital I was blown away at how fast time just passes. I felt like the dance year had just started... and here we are.

I'm going to start with some flashbacks! I always love to compare year by year pictures when I can. My goodness.. I mean see for yourself.....



and the you have "double trouble"





Okay- back to recital day... I'm always scared of how things will unwind that day since dress rehearsals are so early in the morning. I mean what child stays happy all day after being drug out of bed at 6:30 in the morning? Well much to my surprise I didn't have to do much dragging! I guess D's excitement kicked right in and she bounced right out of her room to give Daddy kisses before we were out the door and starting the crazy day! So I followed her with sleepy eyes, stopping to get coffee of course, and off to pick up Abby and Kendall.

I mean she was so excited that she was ready and willing to let me take her picture and actually picked the cute pose herself!



Dress rehearsals went a little slow as expected but we made it. After that things got a little crazy. I won't elaborate on the details from hours 2:00-5:00 but lets just say we caught a curve ball! What's life without curve balls, right? (I just have to keep telling myself that!)

D loves recital day for a few reasons. One of them being her time at the hair salon for her curls... or crazy hair as she calls it.





For the second year in a row she fell asleep in the car. I couldn't blame her. I thought I was going to fall asleep! I was concerned about what kind of "mood" she was going to wake up with but decided it was in her best interest to have the power nap.

The show itself went well. Of course, I had a case of the proud mommy - just like all the others with children on the stage. I'm always amazed at how she comes alive up there on that big stage. She has a tendency to be on the shy and quiet side at times but not when she's dancing. Even during ballet when her 'magic hat' fell off was she phased. She picked it up, put it on, turned it around the right way (of course), and kept dancing away. She even waved to the crowd when she heard us yelling her name, and took her bow at the end of her dance. I told her how cute I thought that was and she replied to me "well, that's what your supposed to do when your done." I love the things kids say!

Here are a few from her time on stage.







Of course, lets now forget the flowers. Lets just say I didn't need flowers for Mother's Day! She has talked about the flowers since Saturday!

{sweet things from my girl}

I've started to get little treats the past few days since Mother's Day is this weekend. D has been talking a lot this week about how Mommy's Day was coming and how her teachers at school have been talking about how you should always be sweet to your mommy. So cute... the way children talk!

Today when I picked her up she had started gathering up all her goodies... "for mommy"!

Here are a few of the sweet things she had for me.






{my best attempt at a picture of us this afternoon..she was more interested in her popsicle!}

This was probably my favorite ... because this is all her perspective of things. Obviously, she knows I love to take pictures. The pizza thing kinda made me laugh, its not my favorite meal... its hers. And it has been our routine Thursday night meal. :)

A lot to catch up on----

It's coming. Look I'm already making excuses.... now that I survived D's fourth birthday party, a trip to Disney World, found my way out from under the pile of tisses, taken the girls for check ups and shots and battled allergic reactions-- i think it is time to catch up on our life.

D's party went off wonderfully. We had a great time and she really enjoyed herself. Her friends are starting to figure out that they have to smile and pose for me. See for yourself ... :)




Aren't they all cute! Here are a few more pictures from the busy party day. :)













Thank you for everyone who came to celebrate with us. We are so blessed to have such a wonderful group of friends.

{the rest coming soon...}