Pictures of the day!

Today was a beautiful day.

Bringing "Gymboree" to Addie

Addie loves Gymboree, but our schedules don't allow us to go as often as we would like. I thought there would be no better present for Addie than to bring "Gymboree" to her! Oh wow, you should have seen her, she was thrilled!!! I did good! :)

Celebrating the end of a beautiful year!

We spent our evening visiting with friends and saying goodbye to Incahoots.


Our friends are celebrating the arrival of their new son home from the NICU. We wanted to spend some time with them tonight. We had a really nice time and I think this visit totally made Addie's whole day. This is the first time she got to feed a "real" baby and she was so ecstatic! She was so good to Andrew! Oddly enough, Addie wasn't the least bit jealous when I was holding the baby, but she didn't like it at all when Julien took him! Julien loved holding the baby and talked about him the rest of the night!


We also managed to squeeze in a trip to Incahoots for dinner. Since it was their last night, we thought there would be no better place to have dinner. We had a good time and met some very nice people! I hate to see the restaurant go.



Thank you Terrie and Brandon for allowing us to spend this time with you! You are blessed with two beautiful boys!

"Happy Birthday to You!"

Addie loved us singing "Happy Birthday" to her, she had such a fun time!

Sweet treat

A treat that is a two-fold memory.

I was completely crazy over M&M's when I was little and managed to pass the craziness down to my children. For Julien's 1st Birthday, we had an M&M theme, with all the accessories purchased straight from the M&M Mars company in Las Vegas - just plain crazy. The sentimental side of me couldn't ever get rid of the last two candles that were never used ten years ago. I asked Julien this morning if he minded if we used them for Addie because it would be so special and "fitting". Of course, he readily agreed.

My Mom made me an M&M cake when I was little and I wanted Addie to have the same...with one exception. I don't bake. I didn't want a typical bakery cake, so I enlisted the help of Kay at Home Plate Cooking. I told her what I was wanting and she didn't hesitate to make it for me! It was PERFECT and Addie loved it!

Lovins'

Memories to last a lifetime

We started out our day by meeting Kim for Addie's two year pictures. I am so thankful for Kim. I am blessed that she is willing to set aside a few hours on this day to take these pictures for us. It was a very emotional day for us, harder than last year, but then again, we know we have to take it one day at a time.

I can't wait to see the pictures...Addie looked beautiful!

Thank you Kim...for everything!

6:00 a.m.

Monkey was cuddled in my arms and holding my hand. She was fast asleep and oblivious to the moment when the clock changed to the 2nd anniversary of her birth.
I was watching her little face as she lay so still and I was so thankful for the miracle that was in my arms.
Today is Monkey's 2nd Birthday. This is a day of joy and celebration and of remembering.

Happy Birthday Monkey!

An extra little thought...

Tomorrow is a very emotional day for Chris and Me. Extra thoughts sent our way would be most appreciated!

I have a sweet little surprise for Monkey and a day planned for "just us". I pray that it is a day of joy and blessings.

Our Christmas gift to Monkey...

Two friends and I decided we would buy our little ones matching tricycles for Christmas. We jumped through the typical hoops of hunting them down, sending a search party to retrieve them and distribute them.

Chris put Monkey's together and we waited excitedly for Christmas.

To our dismay, the tricycle wasn't a very good fit for Monkey. Her balance is really lacking and we have to take the littlest detail into consideration. I told Chris to take the tricycle to the basement and I went on-line to find the replacement.

Saturday morning after my mind cleared a little, I called around until I found a store that had the tricycles in stock. Not only did I totally luck out on finding one in stock two days after Christmas, but I was blessed to get someone to help me who actually knew what they were doing and was very knowledgeable about the tricycles. The lady told me that she had helped other parents from The Bell Center and had learned a lot from them. So, a big "thank you" to Homewood Toy & Hobby for all of their help.

As you can imagine, nothing can be simple for Monkey, not even buying a tricycle. We had to take many different things into consideration, including the center of gravity of the tricycle, the size - because her little legs aren't very long, we had to make sure we could buy a seat belt for the tricycle and also toe clips for her little feet.

Oh...she also suckered us out of a new baby bottle for her baby while we were checking out.

One small road block came up, we still needed the blocks for the pedals. After stopping at the second store, they were nice enough to call a location in Cahaba Heights and thankfully, they had the blocks in stock - and would hold them until we got there! Needless to say, we spent our morning between Homewood and Cahaba Heights and somewhere in between it hit us what we were doing...

Here we are driving all over town trying to find just the right accessories needed to fit a tricycle. A tricycle for our baby who is almost two and cannot balance herself on the littlest tricycle that we can find. We were buying accessories for our baby who can't climb onto the tricycle, doesn't know how to turn the handlebars, much less keep her little feet in the toe clips. When it hit us like a ton of bricks, I looked at Chris and told him how very blessed we are. Sure, we were spending an enormous amount of money on a tricycle and having to modify this tricycle by spending even more money, but wow....our baby was blessed enough to be able to sit up on a tricycle and find pure joy in it! We never knew if that day would come. We are more blessed than anyone realizes!

Look at her! She doesn't know that other babies just jump right on and go, she just realizes how happy she is when we love her and push her around on her tricycle.

I wouldn't trade her or the situation for anything. I thank God for this experience. I am thankful it is me who gets to experience it all!

Skeptics are not allowed...

***Don't forget to pause the music on the lower, right hand side of the blog***

So, granted not everyone will understand what Monkey is saying, but I understand her. She doesn't speak clearly, not even as clearly as children younger than her, but she speaks and the sound is so beautiful!

Enjoy watching this miracle, this absolute blessing! I am so thankful for this gift!

"I love you" and "Thank you"

My priceless gift

Julien got me a very pretty gift for Christmas. Chris got me a very pretty gift for Christmas. I actually told Chris that the only thing that I really wanted for Christmas was all the laundry in my house to be clean and in it's proper place - apparently a swipe of the debit card is so much easier than laundry. :)


My gifts were so nice and I am so thankful for Julien and Chris, they are perfect in every way and I couldn't ask for a better son or husband.


But...

the gift that touched my heart this year is the gift of my daughters voice. To hear the little, precious voice of a baby who should never have talked is a blessing from God, to hear these two new "words" is a miracle from God.

"I love you"
and
"thank you"

You should hear Addie when she speaks these words. The sound of these words touch my heart and into the inner depths of my soul.

She says these words - without a doubt - and at appropriate times only. That tells me that her level of comprehension continues to grow.

Thank God for this gift and for the blessings HE continues to grant us!

Christmas - pictures of the day

Picture perfect

As most of you have figured out by now, I am not a frilly girl. However, I did make a point of buying everyone in my house cutesy pajamas to wear for Christmas.

If you notice in these pictures, Monkey is the only one that ended up in her jammies. The rest of us were so miserably tired by the time we made it to bed, that we threw on whatever was available...matching or not.

So, for all of you picture perfect people out there - congratulations. Maybe next year, I can get it right!

Wrapping it up

We had Christmas Day lunch at my cousins house. The kids had a nice time. It was a blur to me, between the pain in my head and the nausea, I don't remember a whole lot. Julien missed this celebration...

Addie got lots of great goodies, including a monkey blanket from Aunt Sue!

Thanks Apryl for letting me blog lift these pictures from you and for hosting the Christmas Extravaganza!

Santa came

I can't even begin to say how blessed we are for what we have and what we are able to provide for our children. This year, the focus was even more on the meaning of Christmas and not how many presents were under the tree. It was an amazing Christmas, despite Addie and I being under the weather.

Julien was so happy and we were together.

It was priceless.

What do you get...

When you mix one twenty-three-month-old girl, peanut butter pie and a can of whipped cream?

What do you get...

When you mix one ten-year-old boy, an electric hand mixer and cookie dough?

Christmas Eve - Julien

Julien had a blast! He loved everything he got and got everything he asked for.

:)

Family

Christmas Eve - Addie

I wish she would have had a better time...

I'm hoping she will feel better by her birthday, we have a busy day planned!

Two of my favorites from Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve

As you can tell, Addie wasn't her usual happy self.

My family came over for Christmas Eve dinner. We always have such a great time. The kids enjoy themselves tremendously, which enables the adults to enjoy themselves too!

You will notice in the first picture that Thomas was trying to sneak his way in. The cats stayed close by all night. Very odd, considering they usually don't like all the commotion. I guess they were excited about Santa too!