Tuesday, June 30, 2015

Life of Eden


I write an update for Ila each month, but it's been a while since I've written about just Eden.  And I need to; she's changing and growing and maturing at lightning speed!

She's so wonderfully weird, as three year olds are.  You know, like dancing all by herself at weddings.  And barking as we go up and down the aisles of the grocery store because she's pretending to be a puppy.  Or saying her nightly prayer as "tweet tweet tweet tweet tweet" because now she's a bird.  I love it.  And I encourage it.  It's so sweet and innocent and I want it to stay like this for a really, really long time.


She is the biggest chatterbox!  And it's so hard to believe now that once upon a time she was a late talker.  Because now she doesn't shut up.  Ever it seems.  She talks our ears off.  Even when she watches a TV show or a movie, it's all "Look how cute Little Foot is!  Why is his name Little Foot?  Where is Little Foot going?  AH, a Tyrannosaurus Rex, hide me!  Why is Little Foot sad?  Why is Little Foot sleeping there?  Look Mommy, look at Little Foot's tree star!"  (She loves The Land Before Time - she's still into dinosaurs!)


She loves dinosaurs, princesses, trains, animals, flowers, the beach, going on wagon rides, fishing, golfing, swimming (as long as she doesn't put her head under water... she does NOT like that), riding on the Ranger, reading books, horses, going to gymnastics, playing hopscotch, watching movies, watching Mickey Mouse, Doc McStuffins, and Bubble Guppies, swinging, puzzles, coloring (she just recently got into coloring, and now she's constantly coloring pictures to give to everyone we know) stickers, story time at the library, the list goes on and on...

She loves everything.  Really.  When I give her her vitamin in the mornings... "I love vitamins!  They make me big and strong!"  When it's time for her to take a bath... "I love taking a bath!  I love being clean!"  When I ask her if she wants a squeezy yogurt for snack time... "I love squeezy yogurts!"  When I ask her if she wants to walk down to the mailbox with me... "I love checking the mail!"  I kid you not, one time she told me she loved bathrooms while we were in a public restroom.

My favorite?  "Mommy, I love God.  I'm going to tell God that I love him.  (looks up to the sky)  I LOVE YOU, GOD!"

 outside The Children's Museum a couple of months ago (Susie made her sweater... love it!)

She has never met a stranger and loves everyone that she meets.  I know because she told me, "I LOVE EVERYONE!"

She told me the other day that she wants to be a vet when she grows up.

at Train Fest back in April

So let's talk about that puppy up in that first picture.  That's Green.  So back way before we ever went to Alabama, I named Ila's puppy Blue (keeping with her water theme).  Eden immediately went and picked up a puppy and said, "And this is Green".  And I was like um, sure, whatever.  I kinda just thought that she was being silly and didn't realize that she was seriously picking out a dog for herself.  But after that, anytime I said anything about Blue, she would start talking about Green.  I wasn't really sure how to break it to her that she wasn't keeping a puppy - she was so excited and everything - so I just kept ignoring the situation.  The evening we got home from Alabama, she immediately went to Green and started telling her how much she missed her!  I realized then that I was in trouble.  I could NOT take the puppy away from her at that point!  I should have addressed it in the very beginning, but I didn't, I let her think for weeks that she was getting a puppy.  So I told Dustin that we had to keep Green too.  (FORTUNATELY somebody who was originally supposed to take a puppy backed out.)

So, uh, for those of you keeping count, that brings our total to SEVEN dogs.  We're being featured on the next episode of Hoarders.  So now Eden has two dogs of her very own.


Daisy and Green in Eden's room

Eden gets to fall asleep every night with Green next to her, but I sneak back in after Eden is sleeping and take Green out since she's not completely potty-trained yet.  



Eden goes to bed every night at 7:30.  Which is ridiculous because it's still completely light outside. 

We still spend Tuesday mornings at gymnastics.



And she also started horseback riding lessons a few months ago!





So far, so loving it!

Also (this was super exciting to me!), she has enough hair now to pull all of it back into a ponytail!



We've been golfing.  Putting her Easter present to use!

 I think her golf clubs are so dang cute next to Dustin's!







^^^ The blow pops were my Mother's Day present from Eden!  :) :) :)  Dustin asked Eden the day before what she wanted to give me for Mother's Day, and her answer was "lollipops!"  Dustin took her to the grocery store so she could get them for me.  Notice the H-E-Buddy sticker - Eden LOVES the sticker that she gets at the grocery store check-out every trip, so I thought it especially sweet that she came home that day and gave it to me!

On the Friday before Father's Day, I took Eden to the Dollar Tree, gave her a basket, and told her she could pick out three presents for Daddy for Father's Day.  I told her she could choose anything in the store and to think really hard about what Daddy liked.


The only input I gave was when she came across a fireman's helmet after she already had three things in her basket.  She was so torn about which three things to keep, so I assured her that the helmet would never ever fit on Daddy's head.


"But it fits my head!  Can I have it?"


"No.  We're shopping for Daddy, not you!"

After she had settled on three things, I took her to the gift wrapping aisle, and she chose a bag, a bow and tissue paper.  Then we chose a balloon, went home, put the present together and hid it in her closet.


Of course as soon as Dustin came home from work on Friday afternoon Eden said, "Daddy, don't look in my closet!  There's a present in there for you!"  The rest of Friday and all day Saturday, Dustin kept messing with her and telling her he was gonna go look in her closet.  "NOOOOOO!!!!", she would scream!  On Saturday night, Dustin started walking up the stairs and called out, "Eden, I'm walking up the stairs... I'm going to your closet..."  She FREAKED OUT.  She came running and threw herself at Dustin's legs, wrapped her little arms around one of his legs in an attempt to hold him back and burst into tears.  So sad.  So hilarious.  "Dammit Dustin, STOP messing with her!"

On Sunday morning, Eden ran into our room.  "Mommy, is today the day to give Daddy the present?"  "Yep!", I told her.  She ran and got it and was SO DANG HAPPY AND EXCITED to climb into our bed and give it to Dustin.  Dustin's Father's Day gift:


The bat and baseball were a set.  She was most excited about the plates.  She was very proud that we used them for both breakfast and lunch that day.

I'm happy to report that Kitty-Cat is still going strong!


Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the trampoline that Eden got for Christmas.  It died a tragic death during one of the many thunderstorms we've had; it flew over our deck and landed in a crumpled heap in our pasture.  

Annnnddddd, she is officially all signed up to start preschool this fall!  She's going three mornings a week.  That's all this mama could handle for now, but I'm super excited for her!  She's such a little social butterfly, she's gonna have so much fun!  I can't wait to go school supply shopping (woohoo watercolors and glue sticks!), and we already have her first day of school outfit picked out!

My little baby is growing up, y'all!  

 our dewberries that we picked last month

 funny faces



 combining two loves... being a princess and her garden (we've been having a hell of a time staying on top of the grass situation in her garden thanks to all the rain we've been getting!)

 Dustin's parents gave her an inflatable water slide for Easter.  She's been having a blast!

 We went and visited my mom and Mark last week, and Eden attended Vacation Bible School at their church.  Here's Eden before her first day.

Thursday, June 11, 2015

Ila - Eight Months!


Ila is 8 months and 1 day old.

She has 2 teeth.

She is a happy, happy girl as long as she has two things - her mama and her paci.  If one of those two things go missing, WATCH OUT!

She is getting closer to crawling... she has started getting up on her knees and rocking.  Pushing herself backwards across our hard floors is her preferred method of transportation for now though.

She is only interested in her baby toys for approximately ten seconds.  Give her some of Eden's big girl toys though, and she'll be entertained all day.


We are frequently stopped at the grocery store/post office/donut shop/museum/wherever we are so that people can comment on the blueness of her eyes.  They are BLUE!  SO BLUE!  BRIGHT, BRIGHT BLUE!

She finally got too big for the bassinet, but she's still in our room - just in a pack-n-play now.  (Her room is downstairs, and I don't want her that far away from us!)

She currently holds the title of "Cutest 8 Month Old in the World".  (FUN FACT!  Big sister Eden previously held the title back in 2012!)



Tuesday, June 2, 2015

Road Trip! - Alabama (and some beach pics from Matagorda)

Thursday, May21st

This was a long day of driving (from Biloxi to Birmingham), but we made a couple of stops to make it easier on Eden and Ila.  First up - Mobile, where we toured the USS Alabama.




Eden loved the actual ship, but absolutely HATED all the steep, narrow stairs and ladders that we had to climb to get around the ship.  They freaked her out.


I've had my current car for almost a year, and up until this trip, Eden had no idea that it has a DVD player in it.  On this day, I finally caved and introduced it to Eden.  Not because SHE needed it.  She was fine, she was happy.  But because I was fixing to lose my mind and could no longer answer questions about where we were, where we were going, who was going to be there, where the people in the other cars were going, why that sign is blue but this one is yellow, ahhhhh!  So finally, I was all, "HEY!  Who wants to watch Frozen?!"

We stopped again in Montgomery to take a break from the car and eat dinner, and we made it to Birmingham around 8:00 that night.  We stayed at the Embassy Suites, so Eden had her own little room.  She was verrryyy excited about having her own little room and went around showing us that, "Look, I have my own table!  Look, I have my own telephone!  Look, I have my own TV!  Look, I have my own window!"  


Friday, May 22nd

We checked out of the hotel Friday morning...


...went and ate pancakes and then spent the day at the Birmingham Zoo.




we discovered a hole!  (Dustin tested the goose out first... she was friendly!)





this seemed safer in person?





The weather was perfect for our day at the zoo... not too hot, not too cold, so the animals were out and about and playing.

We left that afternoon and drove to Auburn.


Alabama really is such a beautiful state; I enjoyed the drive from Birmingham to Auburn.



My mom also stayed at this hotel, so Eden had sleepovers with her on both Friday and Saturday nights!

And then Saturday... the wedding... the whole reason for the trip!

Saturday, May 23rd

My cousin, Jonathan, and his adorable wife, Kelli, got married on an old plantation about thirty minutes outside of Auburn.

my cousin, Calli, is modeling on the front steps for me

This was one of my most favorite weddings that I've ever been too.  So gorgeous, so southern, so charming.




Eden tore the dance floor up!  As soon as the band started, she ran out to the dance floor, and she barely left it the rest of the night.  (My mom had to chase her down when it was time for Jonathan and Kelli's first dance.)  Even after night fell and the floor filled up, Eden was still out there, dancing amongst everyone.


I just love that picture of Eden dancing all by herself.  Oh, to be a three year old!




It was a good week; it was a long week.  We left Alabama on Sunday morning at 6:00 and made it to our driveway at 7:30 that evening.  I didn't even attempt to entertain Eden; she just watched movie after movie and movie.  Ila slept eighty percent of the day.  Thank you, baby!

Yay for Eden and Ila's first trip out of Texas!

*****

Dustin and I celebrated seven years of marriage this past Sunday, and we spent the weekend in Matagorda.  I was better prepared for Ila this beach trip, and she was much happier once she had a little fish to play and splash in!