How sweet

My husband had to submit this picture to the paper for his love story he put in there. It hasn't made it to print yet, but he did it for our anniversary. (July 7th) The sad part about the picture was, we did not have 1 picture together recently!! We had to take this one while sitting in the recliner. Oh well, I guess we are always taking the pics and never get in them together - something to think about next time we take pics!! Oh, I got him a couples devotional book called "Night Light" by Dr. James and Shirley Dobson. It is pretty good and we read it every night - makes you sit up and chat a while -I recommend it!

Speaking of Poodles

The girls decided that today was dress up day. The got into last year's Halloween costumes and have been poodles all day. Of course, we can never leave Harper out of all the fun, so I had to climb up into the attic and find the girls' old monkey costume. The girls thought it was terrific.

Poodle Poodle

Ok - all three of my kids are big thumb suckers and all three of them have a lovey that they sleep with. Chloe has a pink giraffe, Carly a poodle blanket, and Harper an elephant blanket. Carly loves to share her poodle with Harper. She smells the poodle's ears and Harper smells the blanket part, therefore they can share one blanket. Now Harper has figured out that he can get to Carly's poodle blanket. They all have to stay in their beds, so he can't get to his. He will go into her room, crawl up onto her bed and sit with her poodle. When he is done, he will whine and wait for me to come get him down off of her bed. He can also say "poodle, poodle" - so cute!!

Sorry it is sideways, but this is Harper and Carly snuggling in Carly's bed with poodle


Here is Harper on his perch smelling poodle - too much pink in this picture for this boy!!

A day at the lake

On July 12th we were going to Kaitlyn's 4th birthday party in Elkin. A couple weeks prior we were walking in the park and saw a volley ball court. Chloe looked at the sand and said, "look Mom, snow!!!" I laughed at her confusion (she saw the beach and snow both one time last year!), and decided that it was time to take them to the beach. There is a state park on Lake Norman that has a beach area, so we left for the party early and spent the morning at the beach. They loved it!!! Last year the girls would not even touch the sand, and this year they loved it. They built sand castles, and ran back and forth to the water. Harper of course was everywhere and tried to drown a couple of times. He has no fear!! It was a great day.Carly trying to empty the lake!

Daddy and his girls (Harper was probably under water)

Happy 4th of July

This year we decided to try the firework show for the first time. We haven't seen one since before the girls were born. So that day we went to the pool, out to eat at Lonestar, and then headed to Monroe to get a spot for the show. The girls were very excited, but nervous. Uncle Kris and Matt decided to get some cheap fireworks on our Gatlinburg trip and set them off - of course they were the loud screechy ones. So they were talking themselves through the whole night. When the show finally began, they both just snuggled in our laps and looked the other way!!!! We had to take pictures of the fireworks with the digital camera for them!!! They are so goofy - but hey, they didn't cry! We did catch them a few times looking out of the corner of their eye. It was fun - Harper just crawled around and layed down on the blanket when he was tired.

Chloe and Mommy - she made sure I had a good grip on her!

Daddy and Carly enjoying their preshow popcorn.

The fireworks the girls saw - through the camera.

Mommy, Chloe, and Harper watching the fireworks - Harper loved every minute - he is such a tough guy!

Harper's Birthday

Sunday was Harper's birthday, so we decided to take him out for a special treat! His first ice cream cone!!!! Yummy! We got him chocolate and he thought it was cold. He did not eat too much, but since then has definitely acquired the taste. The girls thought it was fun seeing him lick his cone.

Dance, Dance, Dance

Well the day finally came for the girls dance recital! I was so excited and anxious to see what they were going to do on that giant stage. The rehearsal was Friday and I just sat in the audience bawling my eyes out! This is something so special to me and I couldn't believe my babies were about to do their very first dance recital. They tip toed out on that stage and did SO GOOD!! My shy little girls actually did their dance!!! They did everything! There was a girl, Miss Katie, that was on stage with them to help them out. Did they smile, no, but when they got home they were little dancing machines. The next day we went to the recital. They were the first on the stage because they had received a perfect attendance award, so they waltzed out with metals around their necks for that. Then they came out and did such a tremendous job. They danced to Old McDonald. They had a lot of support in the audience: Matt and myself (Harper went to Mandy's house for the day), Grandma and Grandpa, Grandma Kay and Grandpa Eddie, Polly, Sarah and Preston, Ni Ni, Reilly and Reagan, Connor, Oma, Shelley and Delaney. It was a great recital and now the girls have found their passion! There is not a day that goes by that they don't dance around. I am so glad they love dance just as much as I do!
Wow! The girls got to wear blush and lipstick!! They thought that was so cool!

Here are all three of them waiting to go on stage. Annsley is the girl on the far right.
Going out to their letters where they stand - so cute!

Connor came camping

After the Harper's birthday party, Connor stayed with mom for a week. I went over to mom's house and Connor and I went camping. We pitched a tent, read books, cooked marshmellows, and sat by the fire. It was fun.

Connor had fun pitching the tent by himself. He did a good job.

He had a sleeping bag all set up in the tent.

We read books using our rooster flashlights and then we pretended to sleep. He did not sleep in the tent, so we just pretended.

Happy 1st Birthday Harper!

I can't believe my baby is 1!!!!!!! This year has gone by SO fast. He is such a great boy. He is always smiling and laughing. He crawls all over the place (has been since 5 1/2 months) and is just a sweet boy. We had his birthday party at the pool since he thinks he is a submarine. He will crawl in the pool at the aquatic center until he is completely submerged!! Then he comes up laughing. We all swam for an hour and a half and then went to the park for food, cake, and presents.

Harper dove right into his cake!

Kaitlyn did too!

Reagan just tried to inhale the whole thing!

Connor was just being silly as always

And Reilly very daintily chopped away at hers. We all laugh at Reilly for her famous saying when she was 2: "I eat cake!!!"

Tractor

Harper loves things with wheels. Matt and I walked out of the house one day and this tractor just so happened to be across the street. So, we put Harper in the driver seat and he did not want to get off! He kept saying "tractor."

Water fun!

We decided to have a water day and let the kids get wet - even though we aren't supposed to be playing with sprinklers due to the drought! They needed some outside time!

The girls would not even touch the hose, until Harper started playing with it. Then they decided that it wasn't that bad and they could handle the sprinkling of it.

Oh what they think of!!

While cleaning up the playroom mid June (mind you well over a month after Rachel's college graduation), Carly was in charge of the lego blocks. She had one block left and the lid in her had - she stared at them for a minute, then put the lid on top of her head and stuck the block out the bottom and said, "I'm Ray Ray!!" She was mimicking her graduation hat! She is a trip!

Goofy girl!!

Of course Chloe has to be funny too!

Gearing up for the Recital

This year the girls started dance class. It took them until around October to stop sucking their thumbs during class and of course the first few classes they cried the whole time! By December they started talking to their dance teacher, Mrs. Sabrina!!! They are so funny. They had an award/parent day the first week of June so they could show us their dance. For some reason, Carly was in a stubborn mood and would not participate that much.

Practicing wearing costumes - there was only 1 other girl in their class at the end. They started off with 7 kids total, but the rest quit.

The girls got a 1st year dancer pin. They are all admiring their prize with their teacher Mrs. Sabrina.

Happy Birthday Carly and Chloe

This year Carly and Chloe were so excited for their 3rd birthday party!! We decided to have it in our backyard and rent a jumper. The girls looked through the brochure with me and Carly said she needed the jumper with the slide attatched to it! That one had a big clown head on it, so we turned their party into a circus party. We had a tightrope, elephant bubble makers, ribbon streamers, bean bag toss, a duck game, and a ring toss. They had a blast!!! We had to count down to their birthday and when the day came, they were stoked. I enjoyed throwing it so much because of their excitment. Oh yes, I did have sleepless nights thinking of this party! They love clowns now. If anything gets on your face, you turn into a clown. Like when I brush my teeth and foam gets on my face - I am a clown. One night I went and put Harper in the tub, when I came back in the kitchen, they had taken ketchup and honey mustard and smeared it all over them, they were clowns!! Oh what those two think of!

This was the first year that they blew out their candles! It was such a big day for them!

This was the clown jumper! It was great and we got to keep it for the whole weekend so they jumped alot!

Oh yes, this would be KRIS playing with ribbon streamers!! He was making fun of Matt doing them, and Matt laughed and said "Yeah, but I have you documented doing it!"

They all got clown noses after pin the nose on the clown - Carly ended up getting the nose in the exact spot - do you think she cheated??

There was even a clown that stopped in at the party!!

I took everyone's picture with this elephant thing I made and used it for their thank you cards - here is Connor hamming it up.

We took the girls to see the Doodlebops concert in April (I think) and since then have have named themself each a name. This is Carly - she is Dee Dee. So of course Grandma got them a costume so they can look the part!

Here is Chloe, AKA Moe. Harper has been name Rooney Doodle (the blue one because he always wears blue, but he doesn't have a costume!)

VACATION!

This year we didn't want to go to the beach on vacation (last year the girls wouldn't touch the sand). I really wanted to go to the mountains and get a cabin! So we began our adventure on May 5th and headed to Gatlinburg, Tennesse. My brother Kris, Gina, Connor, and Kaitlyn stayed with us for a few days in our 3 bedroom cabin. We had so much fun spending time with them since they live far away from us. Connor made us play a lot of Golden Tee, the arcade game, that was in the game room. Kaitlyn loved showing us all her "resses" (dresses) - she is such a girly girl! Unfortunately, our kids got sick (what is it with us and sicknesses on vacation??), so we had some very HOT and whinny babies, but that didn't stop us from enjoying ourselves. Matt went with Kris, Gina, Connor, and Kaitlyn to ride go carts! Connor LOVED it! We also went to Cades Cove. According to Matt and Kris it was just a little stop, so we left at 11:00. It took about 1 hour!! Kris was driving on fumes and luckily Gina and I through a little food in a bag to go - there was no where to eat!! Gotta love how Kris and Matt plan things! Then they left and Mom and Grandma came to stay. We did some shopping and relaxing - I had to fight my mom to get out of the hot tub the first night when it started thundering and lightning!! She was so sad - she wanted to flub! On Saturday, the 10th, we ended our trip by driving to Western to see Rachel graduate. It was a very fun trip!

Connor and Harper - Connor loves this boy!!!!!!!

An old Baptist Church at Cades Cove

The hot tub at our cabin.

Shopping

The girls first time playing putt putt! They did a great job!

Grandpa and Chloe waiting for Graduation to begin