Someone is 4

Someone is 4 and will tell you if you see her! Our little shy one is slipping out of her shell lately and telling everyone she is 4. The neighbors, the check out clerks, the family, her friends, her teachers and Larry overheard her chanting to herself "I'm 4. I'm 4. I'm 4." in a sing songy voice while riding her tricycle.

David was leaving for work on her birthday and she says "daddy, tell everyone in your meetings that I'm 4." In the car she'll say "I don't know how to be 4, but I know I'll never be 3 again right mommy?"

I love what 4 has in store for us because 2.5-3.5 about kicked our booty and took our name so I'm enjoying the freedom of enjoying her more and not dealing with the incessant tantrums what felt like every hour. They're still there of course, but fewer and further between making it much more manageable and normal feeling, whatever that is.

I gave her about 100 choices where she wanted to go on her actual birthday and of course she chose Chucks!

she usually wins 15-20 tickets on average with her gaming, but she went off to play some games and came back with the mother load. Talk about a lucky day? I still don't know how she won all these.

and she had a celebration at school with her sweet little friends. There are only 7 other kids in her class with 2 teachers so it's always so quiet and peaceful in there which is great for Lily bc she doesn't like too much chaos. One day she was playing with some rowdy kids at the pool with Aunt Molly and she said to Molly, "I don't like loud kids Aunt Mowwy." Um, has she met her brother?

Grandma and PawPaw flew in for all the festivities and the love was flowing back and forth like the wild rapids.

(One of my favorite pictures.)

and PawPaw had the genius idea to point to her birthday which was also her golden birthday because she turned 4 on the 4th of April. (Allison loves the golden birthday reference:)

I almost didn't recognize Lily when I scanned her room looking for her cute little pigtails and smile because of the crown she wore so proudly. I love her sweet little heart.



She surely didn't want to take off her crown no matter where she went or what she did.

and didn't care about wardrobe malfunctions.

nothing stopped her.

she wanted the world to know she was 4. And proud of it.

And then she could go to any restaurant of her choice for her bday dinner and she chose the "Chicken on the Corner Restaurant". It took us a bit to figure out, but an actual man in a chicken costume stands on a corner everyday advertising for Hurricanes right around the corner from us (hello awesomeness?) and we see it everyday. Since she didn't know the name of the restaurant, she made up her own. So off we went to the ChickenOnTheCornerRestaurant and insisted climbing to the top of the statue for the group picture. She didn't have to know it was Captain Morgan.

Then on Saturday we had the full blown celebration of 4 in true Dora style. She's been asking for a Dora birthday a day after she turned 3 and kept that consistently for the last 364 days. I try to push Barney on her because I love his lovey-dovey friendship themed message and although they are both very close in her heart, Dora always wins the rivalry.

and Grandma Dottie went all out on her cake. She worked on it for days and endless hours and it came out PERFECT!!!!! Even her bangs are layered and the two sprigs of hair pop up like the real deal.

and 48 balloons to match her 4/4/08 birthdate. I'm crazy for numbers; especially on her golden birthday which comes once in her lifetime.

and I'm absolutely in love with the water bottle idea for parties which doubles as decorations and talk about affordable...

and a dora kitchen from her grandparents to complete the theme

and her very own fishing pole from the Hutchesons to entertain her new love for fishing with daddy. (notice the aDORAble dora dress we had made for her special day-oh how I love it)



Grady wasn't himself during the party and wanted to be held which isn't like him, but there were plenty of arms to fill. I think the balloons freaked him out. He loves balloons, but it was almost like it was too much of a good thing for him.

the classic-blow-up-in-the-scrapbook-shot; especially with all 4 candles still lit.

When planning her party, I tried to think of every last detail that would scream "you are special. You are loved. We are celebrating you because you were born." and every time I tried to wrap that into the party ideas, I came up short because the love we all feel for her is limitless. Uncontainable and indescribable....but we sure tried our best and I think she knew.

and if she didn't know, she had a life sized Dora to prove it to her. This gal has a mind of her own and floats around the house like a ghost. She's not even close to losing her helium 4 days later so I think she'll be around for awhile practically taking a spot at the dinner table with us and startling us at every turn.

I've been having nightmares about Dora and her big brown eyes and brown bob haircut. The mask doesn't help either.

using all her 100s of board books at decorations and hanging the paperbacks onto the wall completed the party touches. (for free-holla)





and even aunt Jen came for the festivities and don't know who was more excited about Lily turning 4.

I think some of Jen's talents are rubbing off on the Lillers.


I don't know how all this has happened so fast, yet I can't remember a day in this life without her. Then it feels like this was just yesterday all in the same breath.

it's amazing to have a 7 pound, 4 ounces of love placed in your arms and you want nothing more in this life than to see them happy as they grow so does your heart.

(yes, the 3 month picture is real-lol)

her 2nd year...

and our not so little 3 year old...

and who has blossomed into such a beautiful little soul with still so much growing, learning, and exploring ahead of her.


Lily, thank you for being the rainbow in our house when there was a dark cloud over our house for 4 long agonizing years. You'll never fully understand the hope, joy, happiness, love, and laughter you have added to our home and into our lives. And all I can think of lately is the lyrics from the famous song "We love you more today than we did yesterday. But not more than we will tomorrow." Happy 4th Birthday and thank you for being your funny, sweet, adorable, and thoughtful person you have grown to be and always know you are loved beyond measure.

Life is good.

alliz

how could i not post these pictures from Allison's visit with her amazing boys? To say everyone had a blast is an understatement. I think seeing her a few days ago reminded me of these pictures from the fun weekend.
it was warmer then so we went hog wild in our pool. (hard to look at pictures of the old house I miss so much and doesn't belong to us anymore)

belly flop

seeing pool pictures makes me giddy with excitement for summer fun of pool, beach and water-park days....im one of the few that enjoy the dog days of summer where it's so hot and the only relief is the water.

lily looked like she could've been the middle sister to these 2 sweet boys.

katie and g snuggling up together since he's too young for the home made diving board off the top ledge of the waterfall


and story time with our faux brother and sister relationship...

must add Cal (grady's twin) into the mix of course.


There are friends like Allison that stand the test of time since 6th grade and it's comforting to know she'll be there for my family whatever comes our way. Looking forward to summer where most people complain about the heat, but I love the most! Waterparks, sprinklers, and beach days in our future. And lots of cold AC!!!

life is good.

breathing again (and clean breathing)

We're getting settled into our 2nd house in 2 months. Actually our 3rd house in 3 months if you count our naples house. Long story short, we left our beloved home in naples to a beautiful house on the east coast and got all settled in making into a home as soon as possible because we were so excited about being back together under one roof after David had been traveling back and forth for 4 months leaving this little one broken hearted.

and u know when your kids are hurting, then your heart breaks 100 fold for them.


so we lived in this house and turned it into a home and had a great time for a few weeks...


here

went new places, explored our new town and chased grady all over creation...



signed lily up for ballet where she flourished

discovered monkey joes and things started to fall into place.







or so we thought.

Suddenly, the kids starting getting sick and we thought it was just the common cold, but it didn't seem to go away even though we seemed to be at the dr every other week.






and seemed to live in this waiting room

and then out of nowhere, Lily was diagnosed with asthma. She'd never even had allergies in her almost 4 years on earth so we were perplexed. And stressed.

and scratching our heads wondering what was going on

and broken hearted we couldn't fix it all.

then we had the bright idea of vacuuming our ac vents to rid it of dust and dander thinking it might help with all the coughing, sneezing, watery eyes, and discomfort from everyone. Well, that was the best thing we ever did bc we realized the ac units were infested with mold causing all of the health problems.

Yes, those are mushrooms in our AC system!!!

Needless to say, we couldn't get out of there fast enough because the owners didn't seem to care that the problem wasn't resolved fully so we were forced to leave because the house was inhabitable and dangerous for our babies.

We quickly found another house which we LOVED, but it wasn't going to be ready for us for another 3-4 weeks so the chaos continued because we had nowhere to go. No forwarding address. As we packed up all of our belongings, put it in storage, packed a few suitcases and did the house hopping between moms, molly's, dad's, and a hotel to break up the hutcheson invasion and not overstay our welcome at any one place.

Living out of our suitcases with our stuff everywhere, taking me 10 minutes to find a pair of socks for Grady was stressful beyond belief. Lily was sleeping on pull out couches, grace's bed, daybed, blow up beds while grady slept in his pack n play in bathrooms and closets due to limited space. David and I bed hopped around town as well. Everyone was so accommodating and wonderful reinforcing the importance of family and how they're there for you during the good times and the bad stressful times catching you, propping you up and supporting us through the rocky, yucky times.

Through it all, the kids were such troopers and all they cared about was that we were together. It was so stressful for David and I, but the kids helped us put everything in perspective how basic their needs were and they went with the flow just as long as were together.

so we tried to follow their lead and keep things as normal as possible
here




eating dinners on the go along the way.

bathing in different bathtubs almost nightly it felt like...

here

and I think the cousins secretly liked the adventure.

and danced their way through it all


here

and of course lenny was there to help us with the 4 moves in 3 months. (from naples-to moldy house-from moldy house-to new house)


and the kids never lost their sense of humor through it all barely realizing what was happening. I know it'll be a blip on their radar if even that which blows me away.



so that's the VERY short version of the hell and back we've been through in the last month or 2. I have just scratched the surface of it all and it could've been a reality show, but we are hoping and praying things will settle down now and we'll have the normal day to day stressors to deal with like trying to keep wild Grady in his stroller or a highchair for meals.

so now trying to catch up on life, on pictures, on mail, on bills, on Facebook, on emails, on texts, and get back to normal daily grind living which has started to form back again which is refreshing and makes us appreciate the little things like having our own beds, family dinners, family wagon walks, sidewalk chalk and actually enjoying doing laundry and putting it away into drawers vs the suitcases or duffel bags we lived out of for so many weeks. ahhhhhh

breathing again. clean breathing. for the 2nd time this year.

life is good (again)

their giggles melt me

when u have a second baby, it's as if another heart grows within your chest and then both of them are happy and healthy and giggling together, it's pure perfection. this was a few weeks ago on a particular tough day dealing with our issues at the old house (still hard to articulate all that happened there) and had to get them out of the house asap; a quick trip to taco bell seemed to do the trick and my puffy eyes that were hiding behind sunglasses began to soften as they taught me and continue to teach me about perspective. You can tell we rushed out of the house based on lily's hair and her attempt to groom grady.

click here

slidin' home

the playground is a whole new ball game now that grady has mastered the slide. Climbing is in his DNA like basketball is in Michael Jordan's genes so he loves to climb then slide about 432 times in a row. Rinse. Repeat.

Lily is very protective of her little bro who she treats with kid gloves and loves to catch him at the end to keep him safe.

weeeee

I got ya...

somehow the grown ups always get suckered into going too...

some afternoon play doh fun in the old house (more on that later-still can't process all that's happened)

followed by a haircut

lily went on a little preschool tour when we first got here. It took us a long while to find just the right place, but she got lots of snacks while shopping.

most preschools here want the child to stay with the class for an hour or so to get them acclimated while the mom sits on the sidelines trying to find a match

and then there's always that tricky preschool homework. I don't know who was more stumped.

and this one who keeps us on our toes constantly and makes us laugh incessantly and a total party animal.

life is (getting) good!

checking in...

You wouldn't believe what the last few weeks have brought us if I told you so I won't be accused of lying on my blog and will just post a cute video of the kids who make all this craziness around us worth it, they center us, keep everything in perspective about being happy and when you're knee deep in the thick of a big mess, just hold hands super tight, laugh a lot and dance....

and remember to dance....(lily teaching david a "ballet run"

more to come from the saga we're enduring right now. words escape me when I try to articulate it all. Good news is the family is healthy and the kids are happy so in the end that's all that matters! At least that's what I keep telling myself!