Jeep Ridin'

      After the zoo C took a nap and then we headed up to Nick and Chrissie's for dinner and to try out the jeep for the first time since Cammie got it for Christmas.  Pop rigged the jeep with a wooden block so Cammie could reach the pedal (since she is still a little small for a Power Wheel).  Once she realized the pedal made the jeep go...she was gone!  Unfortunately she doesn't understand pushing the pedal and steering at the same time lol....we barely made it past Chrissie's neighbor's house!  We helped her turn the jeep around and get back to Chrissie's driveway and she ran right into my car!  She is a mess, but had a ball!  Here are a few shots of her playing with her big toy.

Getting ready to ride

Oops! She ran right into mom's car!

Look at me!

Monkey...she is a climber!  Lovin' be able to climb in and out all by herself!

   

Chrissie's Baby Shower

     On Sunday we celebrated Chrissie and Baby Ellie at Chrissie's baby shower.  Chrissie's sister, mom, aunt and I hosted a baby shower to celebrate the upcoming arrival of Ellie-bell.  We are so, so, SO excited for baby Ellie to come!  I can't believe she is almost here!  It seems like just yesterday I was standing in the kitchen opening mail, talking to Chrissie when I opened a thank-you card from Ellie to Cammie.  Ellie was thanking Cammie for inviting her to C's 1st birthday.  I still remember not fully comprehending the news I had just read in that card.  To say she caught me off guard is an understatement.  :)  9 months has almost passed and Eliot Ann will be here before we know it.  All of Chrissie's family and friends came to celebrate and shower E with TONS of smiles, excitement and gifts.  That beautiful baby girl will be loved and spoiled by so many people (including me :).  I think Chrissie will be like me and have to fight to hold her own baby girl in the beginning. :) Hurry up May 8th....we are READY to meet our Ellie!

Grandpa Bud and his girls :) 

Katy and Chrissie are due about a month apart...Katy is one of our best high school friends and is having a boy (boyfriend/girlfriend in the future???)

Cammie and Maddie plotting their escape :)

Aunt C and Monster

Helping Aunt C open gifts....she made her presence known and tried to be the center of attention

"Aunt C I have these in my bathtub"

Loving her own bag of Mark's special chocolate chip cookies...they are a big hit at Christmas we found out

Eliot's dirty clothes hamper...letters courtesy of Meghan (Chrissie loves C's bucket that we use for dirty clothes :)

Bouncer...this was a necessity in our house!

So sassy...not sure why those arms are crossed, but she does this now when she doesn't get her way.  Where does she learn this stuff????

My monster :)

She LOVED this bag...she played, rolled in it, pulled it up like a blanket while Chrissie was opening presents. She is a mess!

Ellie's Nan (Chrissie's mom) and the start of E's library 

Still playing with the bathtub squiters

The stocking Aunt Caitie (Chrissie's sister) sewed....so cute!

Chrissie and E will be stylin' with their new Coach diaper bag (courtesy of Aunt Caitie)

The 3 amigos....about to become 4 :)

Zoo, zoo, zoo

  Spring break was just gorgeous and we tried to take advantage of the beautiful weather and having Chris home at the beginning of the week.  On Monday we went to the zoo.  Cammie is at such a great age this year for the zoo! She loves animals and has started to express such an interest in animals other than our dogs. :)  This was mine and Cammie's 2nd trip, but Chris' first to see her in action.  Although she needed a nap (we timed it bad, as I went to the gym and Chris worked on the field in the morning...we thought she would nap after lunch, but she is still getting used to being with 4 dogs instead of just 2 and well....they were just too loud), she did pretty well as we navigated the zoo.  Right now she seems to enjoy watching the giraffes, gorillas, polar bears and sea lions.  During this trip the hippopotamus had returned and she was so intrigued and curious. :)  We had a great day and can't wait to head back one Sunday!

"Look dad, the elephants!"

The loves of my life :)

"Calling" the goats (She refused to touch them, but called them to come here by patting her leg like she does the dogs...silly girl :)

Calling the donkey to come over

We can no longer visit the zoo without going to the playground....She is too big!

Peek-a-boo mom :)

Wheeeee!!!

Going down the big kid slide...she is fearless!

My favorite picture of the day..look at her standing on her tip toes to see the hippo :) So curious!

Driving the truck with the bears in the back :)

Love the way she watches... :) She just laughed when the sea lion would swim by.

 

Spring Break

     Whew! We have had a very busy, yet very wonderful spring break!  I hate the way time flies by even faster when I am off! :(  Here is a recap of our week:

Saturday:  Today we headed off with Chrissie & Nick and Meghan & Brad to IKEA and the Gap Distribution Center.  We were originally going to hold off going to the Gap until we went to the Reds for Opening Weekend, but crazy Chris has a double header scheduled the day of the Reds game and forgot to look at his schedule before we bought the tickets :( We are hoping for a single game against Borden or 2 super fast games so we can still make it in time for Opening Day!  We stopped at the Gap first and didn't really proceed through the way we normally do....Chrissie is super pregnant and I'm not sure the rest of the crew loved looking through the mess at the Gap.  Sometimes it's exciting to find such great deals...I don't mind to look and dig too much :)  I ended up with an awesome pair of gray linen pants for $10 and C got a cute romper for the summer, but that was all I found in the short amount of time we were there.  Next we headed to lunch and then were off to IKEA!  We were on the search for a few bigger things for our new house.  Most importantly on the list: playroom storage.  We found ALL of our playroom storage, in addition to a table and chairs just C's size that will be perfect in her new room o' toys.  I am so, so excited to get it all set up and have all of C's toys organized just so (even though I know she will destroy the organized chaos in a matter of seconds :)  Chrissie and Nick bought some storage for their future playroom, which made our ride home pretty cramped.  Poor Chris couldn't hardly move his legs when we got home because we had to put the back seat down to get all of the boxes and ourselves to fit into the car for the ride home...we always seem to get ourselves into some kind of situation when the four of us are together :)  After IKEA we came back to mom and dad's where Nick caught the second half of the U of L game and we all celebrated their victory with Sportstime pizza....yum! :)

Sunday:  C and I celebrated baby Ellie with Chrissie for her baby shower...see separate post :)

Monday:  Chris, Cammie and I headed to the zoo on a BeAuTiFuL spring day...see separate post :)  Later we had dinner with Nick and Chrissie and went jeep ridin' for the first time (another separate post :)

Tuesday:  Today I woke up and my allergies were terrible :(  I am not one of those people who suffer from allergy symptoms every time the weather changes or every year.  Mine seem to be pretty hit or miss, but sometimes when they hit they just catch me very off guard...today was one of those days. :( I tried to shake them by heading to the Y with C.  Next we came home, ate lunch and C and I took a little nap (one of the reasons I love a break...nothing like a nap in the middle of the day :) When we got up, we got ready and headed to a few stores to do some furniture shopping.  We are in need of new living room furniture, a dining room table and chairs and a few things here or there to go along with the things we already have to "complete" our new house.  After looking around Haverty's and Ashley furniture we headed to visit my grandpa and Cammie's great-grandpa and then over to Chris' mom and dad's house to celebrate Chris' dad's birthday with a yummy dinner and some oh-so delicious, healthy cupcakes.  Chris' mom and sister, Maggie made cupcakes with chocolate cake mix and diet coke.  Only 2 ingredients and they were delicious!  I wish I would have had my camera to catch how much little C enjoyed them! :) She was a chocolate mess, but ate every bite. :)  So glad we were able to go over and celebrate such a special guy! Happy Birthday Grandpa!

Wednesday:  The crew headed to the outlets.  We took somewhat of a sporadic trip, but mom, dad, C, Chrissie and I had a blast!  We stopped at our traditional Tumbleweed in Seymour spot for lunch.  C is a regular at Tumbleweed and begged for the chips and salsa to be passed her way (making her Nana proud :).  We filled our tummies and headed towards the malls.  They weren't really having any wonderful sales, but I was able to get a good start on my spring/summer wardrobe.  After completely cleaning, purging and packing up clothes that no longer fit I was down to about 3 pairs of capris and 2 pairs of shorts.  I needed a few more additions to say the least.  I didn't really have any luck searching for work capris or clothes, but found tons of shorts and a few fun things to add to my attire.  Thank goodness for a few extra set of hands, as Cammie definitely lived up to her nickname and was a BEAR!  She didn't have much of a nap before we got there (of course she didn't sleep in the car :( and started melting down about 3/4 of the way through the outlets.  Once she finally gave in and fell asleep all was well again. :)  After a day of shopping dad fixed steak and chicken kabobs on the grill and we all (Nick and Chrissie included) enjoyed a yummy dinner and some wonderful company :)

Thursday:  Today we had a pretty relaxing day....and I loved it that way!  We headed to the Y, ran a few errands, I found a super cheap bathing suit (at Macy's...I was so impressed) and ended up making dinner (fajitas...my favorite :) at home for everyone.  It was fabulous!

Friday: We enjoyed the last "official day" of spring break by a great Y work-out, welcoming Nick back from his Panama City trip, spending a few last coupons at Old Navy and Kohls, running some last minute errands and eating dinner at my favorite restaurant with some favorite friends. :) Nick, Chrissie, Brad, Meghan, Maddie, Chris, Cammie and I went to Rocky's Friday night.  They actually were out of high chairs when we first got our table, so our big girls ate their dinner in booster seats!  Loved seeing how big they were, but made me a little sad too.  They aren't supposed to grow up this fast!

Saturday: Nick, Chrissie, Cammie and I headed to Seymour to watch Chris' baseball team in their first official game of the season.  Even though I complain about baseball I do love the game. :)  Chris is so passionate out there on the field and little C gets so into clapping and cheering for the team! Although Chris lost the first game of the tournament, they won their second game, beating Henryville 12-1.  Chris had a very long day as the tournament started at 11 and he wasn't heading back until about 7. :(  Cammie and I headed over to Meghan and Brad's house, along with Chrissie, Nick, Chris G. and Ben to watch the U of L/UK game.  We were hoping for a red victory, but unfortunately things didn't go that way. :( Cammie loved playing with Maddie's toys (they don't quite play together just yet :), but we headed home as soon as the game was over to see dad.

Sunday:  My aunt picked Cammie up early to take her to church and an Easter egg hunt.  Chris and I headed to church and then spent an amazing day together.  During baseball season we don't have the opportunity to spend hardly anytime together, so getting an entire day to ourselves was quite the treat!  We did a little more window shopping for furniture, had lunch, picked up some Easter goodies for C and tried to find Chris some new tennis shoes.  In the meantime, Cammie tuckered out before the egg hunt began (it got pushed back a little because of the weather), so Tammy dropped her off after lunch and she and Pop had a great afternoon nap together. :)  We concluded the night with spaghetti for dinner and Zesto's for dessert.  YUM!

We were so blessed to have such a wonderful spring break!  The weather was absolutely gorgeous and our week was filled with lots of fun, laid back activities that were exactly what we wanted to do.  I sure didn't get enough school work or other things finished, but I loved every minute of my break with my girl!  We are now starting the countdown...only 61 more days until we are in the new house!

Moving Day

     Whew! Moving is such hard work! I have never moved an entire house before and underestimated the work it would take to accomplish the task.  We were also at a disadvantage because Chris had been in LA the weekend prior to the move for work, so we lost our opportunity to have our family and friends help us with the job over the weekend.  Thursday morning was THE day.  My dad and Chris pretty much moved EVERYTHING we owned out of the house.  The two of them were responsible for loading and unloading couches, beds, dressers, the washer, dryer, boxes and anything else that was a part of our home.  Thanks to Christie, I was able to direct where things should go and finish anything that needed to be completed in the house (packing boxes, organizing, running errands, etc.) without having a certain someone "help" me. :)  It took us over 12 hours to completely finish the move.....way longer than I ever expected.  It didn't help that we had to stop in the middle to go close on our new house, in addition to monitoring baseball practice and working a family literacy night (we wore WAY too many hats that day.....who knew March 15th would be such a popular day?) .  As many people know this is only the first part of the move.  We moved in with my parents and will be here for the next 10 weeks.  Although it is weird for all 5 of us (dogs included) to be under one roof I am SO appreciative of them letting us stay here.  We had no where else to go. :(  Although we are cramping everyone's style you wouldn't know it if you talked to mom or dad.  We have our fingers crossed that the next few weeks are filled with great weather, great basketball (March Madness) and baseball, baby holding with our bestest friends, lots of laughing and opportunities we will look back on and laugh about in the future. :) We are in the home stretch now......can't wait for the 2nd part of our move...hoping it will be our final move! :) 

Counting Our Blessings

     Yesterday was a crazy day to say the least!  With all of the unusually warm weather we have been having thunderstorms have become a normal part of our February (and early March) forecast.  Unfortunately yesterday's storms and tornado completely destroyed a high school, many houses, buildings and the hope of an entire town just 5 miles away from our house.  As I continue to see pictures of the damage Henryville experienced I am just amazed!  The devestation the town experienced is heartbreaking!  I think of how selfishly frustrated I felt yesterday that we weren't able to get our kids at school home safely before the storms hit, but realize how lucky and blessed we were to be in those safe, hot and crowded hallways.  My thoughts and prayers are going out to those people affected in Henryville, Borden and any other area that was hit hard yesterday.  Here are a few images that will serve as a reminder to count and be thankful for your blessings each and every day!

Henryville High School (taken from my brother's phone)

Unbelievable!

Another view of the high school (courtesy of Nick's phone)

Fun in the Tub

     These days Cammie loves to play in the bath.  We have tried to build quite the collection of bath toys and utensils to keep bath time exciting!  Here are a few pictures showcasing her tub time fun!

Look at that mess of toys behind her!

Mohawk time :)

She's pointing to tell me that says, "momma" :)