Benjamin {8 months}

Benjamin turned eight months on December 17th, his sister's birthday. 

He will have an official stats check at his 9 months check up next month. At his sick baby visit last week he weighed 17 lbs. I'm eager to know his height and how he's grown. With the massive hands and feet and long fingers on this kid, I wonder if it is a prediction of his size at all or if he's just a little lanky in those areas.

He has started doing so much this month:

Finger foods: Avocado, banana, oat cereal, apples, cheerios

Real deal, fast as all get out, crawling

Pulling up on some things

More vocal than ever and imitating everything we do

Playing pat-a-cake

Waving Bye Bye

Snapping his fingers

Two Teeth

What, What?! Still breastfeeding. Despite being out of our frozen milk stash for almost 2 months, this little guy has still only had mama's milk. It's taken a little sacrifice on mama's part. Like having to work later because I'm stopping in the middle of my day to feed him and choosing to go in a back room while visiting with family or friends to feed him because we don't have any bottles saved. I really don't mind it though. Love the little one on one time with my buddy. 

Excuse my geekness. I've been playing on pic monkey and figuring out how to create little things like this:

(This post has been sitting as a draft since Christmas. Such a bad mama... Better late than never!)

Emma's 3rd Birthday

Vintage Cinderella Party

I went around and around on what to do for her 3rd birthday party. She's been into everything this year from Mickey to Veggie Tales to Dora and to most recently princesses. She really goes into phases of things she wants to play with and talk about. Really the only constant she has is Dora. Whenever she gets tired of something she always goes back to Dora. In fact, the only thing she asked for her birthday was a Dora Pony Adventure. I couldn't wrap my head around throwing a Dora party though. I always said, from the first day she watched that show, that I would never throw her a cheesy Dora birthday party, despite the fact that she would love it. I just couldn't do it. 

When my sister suggested a Cinderella party, I thought, great... a cheesy princess party. The only princess that Emma knew anything about was Cinderella. She had watched parts of it a handful of times and started asking about princesses. When I first asked her what she wanted to dress up as for Halloween, she said a princess and Cinderella was the only one she really knew. When I decided on princess, I knew I couldn't do anything cheesy so I began my search for inspiration.

Pinterest caused this obsession with vintage princess parties. You can find tons of ideas for Cinderella and princess parties and they were not cheesy at all. I fell in love with a certain party on Dear Lillie. You will see that is where a lot of the inspiration for Emma's party came from. It was simple, yet unique, and perfect for a budget. I don't think I bought a single decoration. I used printables, Christmas and home decor from my house and my sister's, and lots of things from Emma's first birthday. Food was simple. Cupcakes, chocolate covered pretzels and popcorn, danish wedding cookies, chex mix, cheese, and meatballs. Rinsed down with tea and lemonade. Or Emma's current favorite, an Arnold Palmer.

Unfortunately, it was a horribly rainy day. Lighting was not ideal for my little camera and I'm not quite sure of my editing skills on this new computer yet so my photos are not quite up to par. Hopefully Stephanie will have some better ones for me.

I really hoped that it would be pretty enough outside that we could enjoy our backyard because we desperately needed the extra space. Our little home does not hold many people, but we crammed them in anyway and had a good time. With such little space, I couldn't plan much for the kiddos to do, but Emma knew exactly what she wanted to do. Food. Cupcakes. Presents. Play! 

We tried to get a family photo. You see how successful we were. My lazy eye. My husband's tendency to close his eyes. A THREE year old who runs and screams "Don't take my picture!" And a hungry eight month old who was ready for a nap. Maybe one day my children will learn to pose for the camera.

Happy Birthday Emma

.Three.

So many awesome things have happened with this little girl this year. She turned 3 on December 17th. This year she has become a big sister. She has learned so much about love and giving. She has given so much of herself and her time and shared with her new baby brother. She has the biggest heart and lights up a room with her sweet little ways.


Things I love about my Emma this year. .

• Her sweet little southern accent that I constantly try to correct.
• Her constant refusal to wear what I pick out.
• Her need to run around in only her underwear, if that.
• The way her imagination has developed. From only putting toys in different places, to 'mama'ing her babies, to having her babies talk and interact. And I just love the conversations that she has with them.
• Her ways of lining things up and organizing her toys.
• Her way of hiding things from us and herself, only for me to find something weeks later.
• Her amazing understanding of the English language and constant development of proper grammar.
• She carries on amazing little intelligent conversations and then awesome little antics in her own understandings.
• The way she has coined "evercare" as a word in our house.
• The way she randomly calls people by their real name instead of their given family pet name.
• How she has learned to recite and learn and recognize and even begin to write her ABC's and 123's.
• The was she says her full name.
• She became potty trained months ago but still refuses to go to the bathroom by herself and that's ok. There are many days that I just want her to do it herself, but if this is one area that she still needs us, then that's ok.
• How she will never let you be the one to hang up the phone and if you hang up first, she calls you right back.

There are so many more things that I would love to add, but I think my favorite thing of this past year is the way she won't let you leave without a hug and a kiss. Many mornings that's about 10 hugs and kisses from mommy just to keep me home a little longer. She pulls you close and makes you feel loved and that is my most favorite part of the day.

Another year gone and I love watching this little girl learn and grow!

Christmas tree farm

At the beginning of December, we went to a Christmas tree farm in Chunky, MS. It was way to far to drive to get a Christmas tree, but I would do it again. It was a great experience. Emma had a blast. There were light up singing Christmas trees, farm animals, a playground with awesome swings and bicycles, a gift shop, snack bar, sleigh rides, and a LOT of Christmas trees to cut down of all shapes and sizes. The original intent of going to the tree farm was for my sister's birthday. She wanted a live tree and to take their Christmas card photos. They turned out really cute and you can see them here. I've always been a fan of the fake tree just because of the no fuss factor, but next year I think we will make another trip and buy a real tree. We absolutely couldn't leave without a tree ourselves so, of course, Emma got a tree for her room. I had all of these little pink decorations left over from Emma's first birthday and my sister made the adorable yarn Christmas trees so all we had to do was buy the tree.

Egg Bowl 2012

The perfect end to a wonderful football season. The Egg Bowl. And we took the whole family.

Our children are just a little bit confused. Benjamin spent the ride to Oxford wearing his maroon then changed into some red and blue. Emma has been wearing maroon and white all season and I put her in a red shirt with blue jeans. Seriously, they could care less, but one day they will choose a school and if it is one of these schools over the other, then I can pull out these pictures and say "Look, you've been a fan your whole life!" Hopefully I won't have to worry about that because they will be my little genius children and go to a prestigious med school.