Breakfast with Santa

We had breakfast with Santa last weekend at church. It was a wonderful day and it was so nice not to have to wait in line at the mall! Last year we made the trek to the mall three times and all three times we had to get out of line because it was taking WAY too long! So, Circle #7 at Main Street UMC decided to put on a fundraiser that benefits our organization and saves parents in the community the need for headache relief! Emily Grace with Santa
Santa's Helpers!

Waiting in line- she was getting sleepy! Thank heavens she lasted!

Wiggle Butt!

And we're done. That's enough of the strange man with the itchy beard.

This is such a sad little picture! We attempted having family pictures taken out in the cold at Old Salem. It was about 35 degrees and Emily Grace did not want to be set down. I know it makes me an awful mother to giggle, but as happy of a baby as she is, this picture makes me chuckle a little, just because this isn't her at all! I know- slap my wrist!

Heart Melting!

These pictures just melt my heart! They're from a month and a half ago when Aunt Kimi "HOOKED" her new hubby, who we now affectionately call Uncle E!

Really, Emily Grace felt awful this day- she had a fever, she was cutting new teeth (as you can see from the drool on her chin) and she couldn't walk down the aisle. But, she was a little trooper and quite the little flower girl!

How time flies!

I have to apologize once again for the large gap in time in our family's posts.

The holidays are here- YAY! Snow, Santa, lights, trees, presents, food- it's all great, but let's not forget what the Holiday Season is about.

Hold the door for a pregnant woman, a woman with kids, an elderly couple, or the guy behind you who's rushing to get out of the cold so that he doesn't have to take his hands out of his pocket.

Smile when you pass someone in the hallway. Ask about their day!

Let that car cut in front of you without his blinker on.

Let someone else go first at the grocery store.

Wave and smile!

And here are some VERY LATE Halloween Pictures of our little blessing!

GO SILLY TOGGIE TIGERS!

So, we all new that we would have a talker on our hands. The signs showed early that Emily Grace had the talking genes! In one short week Emily Grace is now shouting "doggie!" which comes out more like "toggie!" and points at the dogs. It's amazing- I mean one minute she was a baby and the next she's telling me that's a dog over there. I wasn't ready for that but Chris and I are so proud anyway!

The next day she started saying something like "Silly..." in the backseat on the way to preschool. With a little coaxing, she was singing "silly" all the way there. It's so cute- she has a little gap in her front teeth and when she says it, it comes out like a snake with a lisp and a big grin.

When I picked her up that night, I walked in, she looked at me and said "Tiger!" WHAT? Where did she get that? I wish one of us could take credit for being a GENIOUS and teaching her the word Tiger, but we can't. Our daycare teacher, Mrs. Deborah, has a "toggie" in the back yard (who we say hello to every time we pass by) named Tiger. Mrs. Deborah said she told her his name was Tiger a few times and off she went, "TIGER! TIGER! TIGER!"In the last day or so, we've been merging the three words here and there- it's so cute and she's so proud when she says them! She says something and then looks around to see who heard and to see who is going to praise her for saying it. She's such a little person!

And it was perfect timing for tonight's game! If we can just get her to put "GO" in front of "Tiger!" we'll be set!!!!

GO (Silly Toggie) TIGERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

One last thing:

We're teething again! I mean it, the whole family is teething. When she's going through this, we ALL go through this... never the less, she'll be ready to eat some CHICKEN in about a month!

October is here!

I love the beginning of fall but I do NOT love the cold that comes with it. This morning it was FREEZING cold outside- in fact, they're calling for frost tomorrow morning. Oh there went our lovely summer. I'm sorry Rich and Alex, you must be SOOOOOO cold way up there!

But with fall comes Halloween (my FAVORITE!) , Clemson Football, changing leaves, hot chocolate and Kimi's wedding! We can't wait. I'm planning on a solid 30 minutes to get Emily Grace dressed that day. Chris and I spend double the amount of time we used to spend getting her dressed, as one of us normally has to chase her across the room to put her other leg in her pants! I'm not looking forward to stockings- white ones at that. I should take about 4 back up pairs just to be safe. We will keep the children's hoisery industry in business this year!

We've had a rocky few weeks, but good ones none the less. Changing baby sitters is ALWAYS a HUGE stress but we had to change a few weeks ago. Everything happens for a reason, right? Thank heavens for our angel of a neighbor, Ann Marie, and her two darling little ones, Claire and Lilly. They took Emily Grace for us for a few days and I cannot thank them enough! Emily Grace LOVES playing with her girls.

Emmy Gu is now at three places each week. She has to go to preschool three mornings a week, she goes home with one of the preschool teachers those three afternoons, and then two days a week she's at an in-home day care. I know it's tough for her to adjust but I talked to the pediatrician and she said if anything, it'll make her a very flexible and patient child. LET'S HOPE SO! At least she's social, right?

Last night she opened the silverware drawer and had a fork in her hands. A FORK! I guess she's taller than we realized. Oh speaking of, we had our 15 month visit the other day. She is now 75% in weight, 90% in height and 95% for her head. She's starting to level out. Her height at 12 months was beyond the 100% mark! She gets that (along with everything else but her cheeks- that's from my side) from her daddy! She's getting LOTS of hair(by my standards) and LOTS of personality. She speed races me across a room to touch forbidden objects (shoes, remote controls, power cords, dirty dog toys, etc.) She's a busy girl and the adventures continue!

This has to be one of my all time favorite pictures- it shows her personality (and her Clemson Spirit) so well. See her hand in that cup holder- yes about 3 minutes before that, mommy's beverage WAS in there. The pavement got a good taste as it (and everything else we get our hands on) was thrown to the grown.

Look at those teeth!!!

LET ME OUT OF HERE!

Take care and I'll post again soon!

First Day of Preschool

It was our first day of "mother's morning out" last Tuesday. It's not exactly a "morning out" for mommy since I'm at work all day but that's OK, it's just the name of the program. She has lots of little friends now!

I'm a little behind on getting pictures up. I had this grand plan that Emily Grace would be standing there like a little trooper, waiting in a new outfit, shoe laces tied, hair bow straight, back pack on, grinning from ear to ear waiting for me to take her picture. Oh wait... she's 1. That's NOT a likely image as you will see. She hated the shoes, the back pack was too big, the hairbow kept getting launched clear across the room(as she has quite the throwing arm-but in a determined mommy fashion, I kept attaching it to those three strands of hair), she can't stand on her own and all she wanted was to be held. Ah well, what can you do? She was still cute and she had a great first day!

You see here, my first mental image didn't quite work- I really thought she'd stand there grinnning. NOT!

"MOMMY- HOLD ME!"

There's a better shot!

And that's enough of the picture taking- clearly, it's not going to happen.

Nevermind the date stamp on the pictures- the camera resets itself when the battery dies.

TUPPERWARE PARTY!

And here was another morning of waiting for Mommy and Daddy to leave the house. She got into the tupperware. Oh what fun!

Look at that sweet little grin- yeah, she knows what she did. Oh but she's too cute to fuss at! Oh, I'm a sure sucker for that smile!

Sleepy Girl

Last but not least- a cute little giggle. This is what happens when you let your child cry themselves to sleep. It makes me laugh and cry at the same time. She just collapsed right there!

At least she figured out to make daddy's blankie into a pillow... poor kid- I've never felt more awful than when we let her cry it out.

That's all for now but there's more to come! Take care!

So sorry

I'm so sorry- I've been awful at keeping up with things lately! Things here are good!
Emily Grace is now pulling up on EVERYTHING and sometimes she uses her mouth/teeth to balance herself while she sits back down... I'm nervous about her chipping a tooth!

We visited the NC Zoo a few weeks back and took another trip to Myrtle Beach to visit Mimi & Papa Urban. We also went to Columbia to visit Grandma & Grandpa Dance- but I think I wrote about that before.

I've spent the last few weekends apart from family. Two weeks ago mom and I flew at the last minute to Ohio because we thought Grandma had taken a turn for the worse. That lady is a trooper! Grandma is doing just fine, she's living in a nursing/therapy home for a few weeks until she gets to go back home. I hope I'm that tough at 88! The good news is she's cancer-free and "isn't ready to go anywhere!" :) I love my Grandma!

Last week the K-ville Urbans took a trip to visit the Myrtle Beach Urbans for multiple wedding activities! Chris and Don went to Englis' "man shower." There are pictures but I won't share them on a family website like this. :) Boys will be boys.

Kimi, me, Dana, Stephanie, Cousin Cristin and a slew of others (13 in all) made the trip to Savannah for Kimi's bachelorette weekend. I think we left our mark! We had a BLAST! There are LOTS of pictures of that to share- I'll have to post them tomorrow though. We did it all- drinks, lingerie shower, Paula Deen's restaurant, Historic Tour of Savannah, shopping, ghost tour (which I missed because I was pooped and now I'm mad I didn't go!), good food, good friends, trying not to break your ankle on the crazy cobble stones that grace the riverfront, pralines, more drinks, and of course Outback steakhouse. Long story short, we waited too long to go out to dinner on Saturday night and after walking all across town, we ended up at the worst Outback in the country. Ah well- food is food, right?

In between all of the traveleing has been lots of cuddle time with peanut and boo and lots of monogramming! I think I might have to take Chris on a date soon- he's such a good husband!

That's really all that's going on for now- I promise I'll do better at keeping the blog updated from now on.

EG and Smith Mountain Lake

Emily Grace has a new chair (she got it for her birthday). She's finally big enough and sturdy enough to sit in it without falling out or off. Baily is LOVING the snack trap in the chair. As you can see, she's preying on Emily Grace, waiting for the cheerios and gold fish to be abandoned. She's such a good dog/vaccum cleaner!

Big Girl!
Cheese!
She also likes sitting backwards- beats me why but she does it. Look at that face- is she her Daddy's girl or what?

Last week we visited Smith Mountain Lake- Here are the promised pictures!

"Mommy- what do you have there?"

Kimi & Dianna
HAHA- They had no idea Kimi jumped in that picture! It's cute anyway!

Peanut

The Group at the lake! Peanut was exhausted and took a 2 hour nap on the boat! Mommy and Aunt Kimi might have drifted off as well....
Look at this view!
CANNON BALL!!!!!
Chris cheesing

Funny Story

Our internet is still down at home and I just got out of some sales meetings here at work. I love my job by the way! I just got to watch the displays being created for photo shoots for catalogs- how cool is that?

Anyway, this story is too funny. We have a little mischievous monster on our hands! This morning we were ready for work and Chris and I both went out to our cars to pack stuff up for the day. We left EG safely on the floor (where she couldn't fall) for the few minutes that we were outside. In that time span, she crawled from the middle of the bedroom floor all the way to our bedroom door and closed it, then sat down in front of it. I think she intended to follow us out of the room (by the way, didn't know she could travel that far yet) but instead she pushed the door closed. Needless to say, I was late this morning because there was no way to get her out of our room! I couldn't stop laughing at the situation, partly because it was a adorable and partly because it panicked me that she was locked in there forever!

You know, I laughed at "Friends" when Rachel and Ross accidentally locked Emma in their apartment but I really had flashes of a bird swooping into our room and flying away with the baby. I know, I'm crazy. Having a baby will do that to you.

Just in case you're wondering, both Chris and I were on our hands and knees in the hallway for over five minutes (it's longer than it sounds) trying to scoot her forward from behind a closed door. We inched the door open and she scooted an inch; one of us held the door while the other tried to reach around and scoot her forward again. Eventually the opening was large enough for me to get my whole arm between the door and the frame and slide her over so that she wouldn't get smacked in the head when we tried to open the door. Of course, she giggled. That little laugh just washes away the rest of the world and melts your heart. I'm glad someone found it comical.

Our little mover & shaker

Thank you guys for you concerns with Emily Grace's tubes- she's doing GREAT! She's mommy's little trooper! And yes Jessie- she is talking MUCH more now. I'm just waiting for "Tigers!" to come out of her mouth any day now! She's also (finally!) trying to pull up. I think in this little bit of time she's gotten a lot more balance because all of that mess isn't clogging up her head and messing with her equilibrium any more. YAY! She's also started scooting/army crawling across the hardwoods. It's funny- she looks like a little inch worm, and man can she move! She digs her elbows into the floor, lifts up her butt and heaves herself forward. She's quick and we learned that the hard way the week before last. In the wise words of my friend Michele "The baby can't fall off of the floor." Please share that advice with every parent you know! The guilt is hard to overcome.

But seriousely, she HAS TO BE WALKING BY OCTOBER 25!!! She's a flower girl in Aunt Kimi's wedding and she's so excited about her new dress!!!!

We went to the lake this weekend and had a great time. We traveled up to Smith Mountain Lake, VA for the day Saturday with some of our friends and Aunt Kimi.

If you've never visited Smith Mountain Lake, I highly recommend it! WE LOVE IT UP THERE!

Emily Grace had a blast- as did mommy and daddy! She even slept for almost two hours on the boat- she's such a good girl.

I'm blogging from work (shhh, don't tell Ralph) because our internet at the house is goofy. As soon as it gets fixed I'll upload pictures at home and send them out.

I hope you all are doing well!
Take care!

The tubes are in!

Emily Grace had surgery yesterday to put tubes in her ears. After lots and LOTS of sleeping, some motrin, and a little bit of an upset tummy, she's doing just fine! This should get those long strings of babbles to turn into words in no time. She's so funny- she looks at you and talks to you just like she's saying something and it's very important. I just wish I knew what it was!

The CAKE! Man was it delicious!


Daddy's girl!


YUMMY!


This is an after the party shot. We're a little cranky here....


Getting ready to swim w/ Uncle AJ


I'm gonna Get you Grandpa!


She loves her lion from Aunt Kimi!


POOL PARTY!

We had pictures taken professionally. I'll have those on a CD this weekend.

Birthday Cookies

Bailey cooling off!

I finally DID IT! I'm blogging! Here are the pictures from Emily Grace's Birthday Party. She had a ball! I'm sad that she's already one but we're so proud of our big girl! Enjoy the pics!