red white and blue

thank you to the members of my family and to all the americans who have put their lives and sacrificed their lives for our freedoms.  to that we are forever grateful.

we headed to the square in downtown mckinney to watch the annual 4th of july parade. we got there 30 mins early and got a great seat. kids were well behaved the whole time and graham had a great time looking at all the classic cars driving by. i think he also enjoyed seeing all the horses painted up so patriotic!

hannah even got into the spirit!

father's day fun

happy father's day (and happy belated anniversary to tim and andrea)!!!

the gang will be heading back home later this afternoon, so i thought why not try to wear the kids out for them.  so off to the splashpad we go!  oh my gosh, perfect weather!!  the kids had a blast, and we enjoyed relaxing and taking in the cool breeze.

to top things off, we wanted to take everyone to three stacks to get filled up to the brim with bbq! oh...and we did!!  it was delicious as usual.  

after lunch we said see you soon!!

they've arrived!!!

not long after we got home from the birthday party did the whole gang arrive.  we were so excited they were here!!

i think someone has an uncle time fan!  ;)

since it had been a long day for everyone, we decided to lay low tonight, bbq, and enjoy a couple drinks together!  cheers to the texas two year plan taking less than expected!!!

waiting

uncle time, aunt andrea, cousin mason and cousin olivia are coming over to our house today.  someone was VERY excited this morning and wanted to sit and wait for them to get here.  hmmmm, it's going to be a little bit buddy.  luckily we have liam's birthday party to go to before the gang gets here!

my little helper

wowie wow wow!  i have a little babysitter on my hands already!

cousin olivia is GREAT with babies!!  she held hannah so gently and secure that hannah sat there for a good 30 minutes i think!  she has a great big cousin to look up to that loves her very much!

miss olivia is also a GREAT helper at bath time!  she helped get the towels ready for hannah's bath, helped dry her off when it was time to wrap her up, picked out her jammers, and even helped lay them out on the counter for hannah so she wasn't left in the cold air for too long.  it was such a big help for me.  thank you olivia!!! 

i tell ya, i'm ready to sign this girl up for a mom's night out!  she's got everything covered!  ;)

family firsts

i'm so happy because this weekend uncle tim, aunt andrea, cousin olivia and cousin mason came over to grana and grampas house!  the boys immediately ran to grahams bedroom and i found them talking to each other under his avengers blanket.

aunt andrea and uncle tim took advantage of some baby hannah bonding time, while i enjoyed a little break!  

it's great being in texas and being close to family, but what really means a lot to me is having the cousins close by for graham.  i love how they're so close in age too!  they're going to have lots more fun growing up together and sharing memories.  

lions and tigers and.....sharks?!

today we headed over to sea world.  the kids first time!

graham LOVED the giant fish tanks.  especially the ones that had the sharks.  he thought it was pretty awesome.

he was also pretty fond of the dolphins.
something tells me we'll be coming back again soon!

say cheese

today grana heads back to texas.  it has been so great having her here to help us with the transition of having one child in the house, to two!  THANK YOU GRANA!!!

someone was being a ham today...can you guess who?!

and even though we are sad to see her go....it's not as sad a goodbye as it usually is.  and that's because in less than two weeks we will all be partial texans (we need to get a house to be official)!

one week old!!

can you believe it!  ONE WEEK already!!!  how did that happen.  time is moving at warp speed it seems.  guess it doesn't help knowing we'll be moving to texas in a little over a week as well.  our world is a little chaotic right now, but we all seem to be handling it well!

some things to note:

had our first well visit and we have lost a little weight, but grown an inch since being born!

little miss does not like sleeping on her back AT ALL!  thank goodness for the bouncy chair on the side of the bed!

had one long stretch of sleep at home, but since then it's been back to normal eating about every 2 hours

loves getting loved by her big brother.  

still has darker hair and blue eyes.  we'll see if the blue eyes stay.

sucks on her fists if she doesn't have her binkie.

cuddle time

we have a definite cuddle bug on our hands!

i think everyone is adapting to be at home too!

visit from grammie

yeah for no work on tuesdays and grammie coming over to visit!  we got some good cuddling and loving in for sure.  and hannah wore her very first hair band!  she is quite the Q-T!

welcome to the world baby hannah!

introducing our new little wee one....hannah!!

it was a very early morning for all.  we had to be at the hospital by 5:30 (yes that's AM) as i would be going back to the OR at 7:30.  as i was in triage getting ready for our little one's arrival i found it odd that both the nurses and my doctor were asking me if i was in pain.  i knew i was having contractions, but they didn't hurt, so no...no pain.  then my doctor said "this is just what i would have liked to have happen!"  so i'm guessing that means our little hannah was making plans to make an appearance on her own in the near future.  

7:30 and i walk back to the OR.  i get prepped and get the epidural and am ready for go time.  i felt like it took an eternity for grady to get back to the room, but i was so glad when he got there.  my stomach didn't do well with the anesthesia at first, but once they got the dosage right everything felt much better.  

but man o man...this little girl DID NOT want to come out!  they were pushing and pulling her out for what felt like 10 minutes!  again, something tells me she was engaged and ready to come out on her own.  we had other plans for her!  then at 8:07 am our little miss was born!!

we love you more than words can describe!

it's christmas!

WOAH, santa ate all the cookies and the reindeer at all the celery!

and santa must have a memory like an elephant.  everything in graham's stocking was.....BATMAN!

someone brought in the loot!  spiderman, batman, ironman, hulk, monsters, and....a view finder!!!  those were some of the hot items this morning as we were unwrapping.  

and then an attempt at some family photos!

we had such a great time. and again, i realized that i didn't snap a photo while grammie and bruce were at our house.  i think we were too busy stuffing our face with sticky buns and hotdog pie!  

merry christmas!

give thanks

grammie was oh so gracious and hosted thanksgiving at her house this year.  and what a fun time we all had!

we did a little exploring outside with mojo.

attempted some KEY-YUTE finger painted cards with grammie (we only got one done before graham became uninterested).

played a little piano and guitar.

caught up with the fam: grammie, bruce, kim, sam, justina and garrett.

and most importantly.....ATE!  :)

and oh my...for dessert we had three, yes three, different kinds of pies.  so of course i had to try all of them!  they were all delicious, along with dinner of course.

i'm so thankful to have this special time with our family.

birthday celebration part II

we headed out west this morning to go to grammie's house.  she's scoped out a puppet show that we'll be going to for graham's birthday (part II).  we got there a little early, so we walked around, played a little croquet and got some plain 'ol energy out.

then it was time for us to head to downtown martinsburg to the wonderland puppet show theater.  the show of the day was the three billy goats gruff.  it was a pretty cute place.  puppets everywhere and little ones for the kids to play with.  when the show started graham even got a special birthday serenade from a puppet doggie, he loved it! (again...he's liking the attention his birthday gets him this year so far!)

we were a little squirmy through the show, but once i got him on my lap he seemed to calm down.  we watched the show and then took some photos with the puppeteer himself and two of the billy goats.  we even got grady in on the action (oh how he loved that!).  :)  

first puppet show was a success.  thanks grammie!

we're grabbing our hats...

...and wishing grampa a texas-sized birthday!!!

special delivery...

...from the mouse himself!!

graham was awestruck from receiving a postcard signed by mickey mouse!  he wouldn't put it down!

thanks cousin olivia and mason for thinking of graham on your disney vacation!

miss keigan

aunt star (now known as aunt bacon) and keigan came up for the weekend!!!  and grammie also came on friday night to have one big sleepover!  it was too cute, when graham woke up on saturday morning his first words were "can i go downstairs and play with my best friend?!"  he LOVES keigan!

he showed her how to aqua doodle and gave a gentle kiss.

then we had some cute moments from miss keigan that i had to capture.  i think aunt bacon might need to invest in a doorway jumper as she seemed to really like it!

graham shared his woody doll (like i said...he REALLY likes keigan!  he would have to to share that doll with her!)

oh, and keigan LOVED miss mojo!  mojo let keigan pet her and keigan let mojo kiss her.  best friends for life!

only one thing that will be a challenge when our new one arrives.  graham didn't want keigan to nap at all.  luckily keigan was just hanging out for a couple minutes when i took these pictures, but graham was always excited to get in the pack and play with her. 

we had so much fun visiting with everyone, but we're going to have one sad boy when everyone leaves!

iphone photos

apparently i forgot to send myself a few awesome iphone photos from when grana and grampa were here!

love all of these!

guess who's here!!!

grana and grampa!!!!

hooray!!!!!

and guess who had to show grana and grampa their new monsters inc. book.  yes, they both had to take a turn reading it to him.

love*