A love visit

David's parents came for lily's 4th birthday. Holy sweet of them! They ooze goodness out of their every pore.



I don't know if they had more fun or the kids did.
(Grady just woke up and received a haircut about 34 minutes after these pictures.)




Lily insisted on taking a picture of me as well.



minutes after the sweetness had landed.

and holy mother of all field trips going to Lion Country Safari. You actually drive your car through the jungle like you're Indiana Jones and animals come 2 feet from your car to say hi. Then there's whole zoo to walk around in afterwards.

and rides too...lily was so excited she surpassed the jungle man's hand allowing her to ride on anything she wanted.

or climb up into this big treehouse like place and feed the giraffe who are not shy about saying hi.

Yo!

LIly is so lucky to be surrounded by so much love anywhere she turns.

They even had paddle boats which were probably my favorite of the day. So peaceful and relaxing to float around aimlessly.

and Grady went hog wild once out of the stroller.

Lily insisted on going on the Merry Go Round by herself this time because she was 4.

ta da

And Grandma joined us for the ceremoniously important event of picking out lily's first big girl bike. We settled on Hello Kitty after much debate, but got it home and realized it was much too small in comparison to Grace's bike. Who knew there was 12", 14" and 16" bikes for kids?

There was many hours spent in the play room as the kids would lure them in like bait and entice them to hang forever with them. Grady will bring you books, say "PEEZ", turn around and plop his bottom into your lap and sit FOREVER! I can't describe how much he loves books and will sit for an hour with you and read books if you let him.

It's heavenly because he's always on the move, but when it comes time for books and/or night time, it's guaranteed snuggle time for sure.

speaking of lures and fishing, there was lots of this while they were here.

and plenty of hours spent on the playground as well. Kids were super excited about it as you can tell.

holy mother of shock therapy.

reading books with grandparents and being pushed on swings by them just screams wholesome goodness

woooooah

the spiked hair never got old to me. We laughed harder every time then inspected cameras for the best shot afterwards...

this running through the fields reminded me of SOund of Music...

the floating Grady

lily playing momma to G. She says "mommy, I wanna be in charge of Grady okay? You go sit down."

weeee

here's a cute picture of the dora dress she wore for her bday that Dottie captured on her big day.

and the cheesy smile....

I can't get enough of G in a tie. It suits him so well. Pun not intended.

and one of our gabillion rides in the trailer to the park in our neighborhood which lily absolutely loves to do and asks nightly. G happily obliges. Thanks Julie for this gift that keeps on giving.

Oh I love this picture and these people.

Larry got right to work on the water bottles minutes after he arrived.

Grandma and Grandpa Stout got a new rug for lily for her bday and completes the play room. I used everything from my classroom and turned our den into a play room instead of an office. Best decision ever. The kids LIVE in this room!

it's like a magnet for kids.

Somehow I had about 24 flags from my teaching days so I put them to good use. Instant wall decorations.

Lily loves to hop in the crib with Grady and they jump up and down so wildly i'm sure they'll break the bed spring eventually.

the love is flowing everywhere.

and a million books were read and a million and more memories were made.

Grady wants to be like Lily and copies everything she does. And I mean everything.

I can't tell you how much Grady loves to laugh and have fun. He's like a walking party on the go.

Remember I mentioned he needed a haircut?


well, Grady has had 2 of them and both have been a total bust with tears flooding the joint. Here's his first one.

I think he thought the scissors were going to attack him or something. Poor G.



a hay ride at the Easter festival at Church

I was hesitant about bringing Grady with us because he's not a big ride guy, but mom insisted and she was right because he had a ball.

and we went out for a last hooray at our favorite restaurant here before they sadly went home.



Visits from the Hutchesons fill everyone up and make us feel so blessed to be surrounded and supported with so much love raising our babies and hoping we are doing half the job they did while growing up. If we are able to pull of that feat, the goodness will continue. Thanks Dot and Lare for being such wonderful, kind and loving people, traveling with a bum knee and being there for us and our sweet little miracles!!

Life is Good!

Easter 2012

It was a big weekend of birthdays and bunnies so we continued on just with a little more dressing up, but life size Dora was still floating around all the deviled eggs. And it's another excuse for a family picture which david loves so much (insert dramatic eye roll) I swear he's in a witness protection program somewhere in Montana and is afraid he'll be uncovered with a family picture.

and the cousins together make my heart melt...and Grady in a tie? Say whaaaaaa? Stop with your bad self G-Money!! (scroll slowly to gasp appropriately) This smile and hair match his personality to a TEE!! He is hilarious!! I love the way Grace is like a super model and Douglas is too cool for school. And you can see Dottie in the reflection snapping away too.

Every time I'm with Douglas and Grace, I can't believe our kids will be their age one day. Then when I'm with Jordan, Anna, Allison and Katie, my brain goes blank thinking of them as teenagers one day. GULP! We REALLY missed the teens this Easter, but I don't think they'd be hunting for eggs and posting pictures of it on Facebook like we do.

On Easter Lily wobbly tried out Grace's bike for giggles, but it wasn't a good experience. She was scared, crying and frustrated and said "i'll ride a big girl bike when i'm 5" and begged to get off. Something kept bringing her back though and I walked her down the street on it and she was bitten by the bike bug. She asked to try it some more and had it mastered in a little bit zipping all over the place all day long. So we decided to get her a new bike as an extra leftover birthday gift. We've had a big problem finding a bike for her to say the least, but I won't waste blog space listening to me vent about poor customer service. (coughcoughtoysruscoughcough) Here she is on Grace's bike trying it on for size.

checking out the loot

G took the eggs and tossed them aside like a baseball rather than basketball into his basket.


Man I love these little souls. I'd dress up in an Easter Bunny suit and hop all over town for both of them.

I can't handle this shot with G standing showing off his cuteness.

Lily insisted on a shot of just the 2 of us. She wanted me to snuggle with her while standing, but I was in a skirt so I did my best effort and looked incredibly teen awkward in the process.

Lily had an Easter show at school and here she is walking down the aisle as I wiped away tears. She bites her finger when she's nervous and she held it there for a couple of minutes and then dropped it and belted out the tunes like Celine Dion. Here's her friend Kassidy she talks about all of the time.

Lily in her Easter show at school with her sweet friends...

Lily and her friend Ella who look like twinsies here....Ella has a little brother Ethan that looks just like Grady too with the blondies. The 4 of them together look like siblings! Hilariously cute!!




Lily listening to the Easter message at Church the day before at the hunt....she's become quite the little religious one. She insists on reading her bible before bed every night (say what?) and asks tough questions where David and I look at each other with a blank stare....questions google can't even answer like "who's tummy was God in and which hospital did he go to when he was born?" Say what? I guess Sunday School and a church based preschool is rubbing off on her. She insists on driving with the sunroof shade open so God can watch over her and apparently the green light in the smoke detector in her room is God keeping her safe while she sleeps. She tells us that nightly along with asking us if the lollipop will say boo and confirms there are no monsters or ghosts in her room. "Only angels in here right mommy?" We hear that nightly!!

and jen snapped this cute almost identical pose waiting for the Easter Bunny at the mall to tell him she was 4. Moments after, Jen was disciplined by the bunny for taking pictures in his pasture. He couldn't talk so he just shook his finger at her all the while hopping around entertaining the chitlins. Talk about a funny bunny!

and a previous visit where Grady had the death grip on me and screaming at the site of the Bun-Buns so Lil had his lap all to herself chatting away. This is from the same person who cried at costume characters for YEARS....now she's asking to sit in their laps.?? Say whaaaa?.

It was a great day feeling fulfilled (and exhausted) by the end of the weekend....

time for night nights G in my 2nd favorite jam-jams of his...

Life is Good.