It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Easter

I LOVE Easter. It is my favorite holiday but I HATE that we can't spend it with family! I have so many wonderful memories from Easter...
1) Being with the Natalie's family and taking our usual picture of me, Natalie, and Emilie... Now we look at the pictures and laugh that we actually thought our dresses were CUTE!!
2) I always loved Easter in college when we would tag along with Brent and Leigh and spend Easter with the Collin's family. I especially think of Melda around Easter and how we all miss her so much! My favorite memory of Melda at Easter is a picture I have of her sitting on the back porch in her apron talking to someone and Beasley (Brent and Leigh's golden at the time) putting his head on her lap!
3) Getting engaged to TJ on Easter weekend!
4) Getting to be with Jackson and Pressley Easter '05 in Raleigh and it rained and we had an Easter Egg hunt in the house... this was also the weekend TJ and I decided we wanted to start a family soon and two months later Karoline was on her way!
5) Last year when Karoline was actually really into her Easter basket! She was so cute and I am sure it will be even more fun this year! And it will be Anderson's first Easter!
But MOST OF ALL I love that it celebrates that our Lord and Savior rose from the dead!! It really is my favorite story in the Bible! I praise the Lord that He is such an amazing God and overcame even death!!
We took out the pink feather tree and put the Easter ornaments on it. TJ thinks it's silly of course but Karoline and I love it. I will NOT put an Easter tree in Anderson's room...


We did some Easter crafts and she really wanted to try and use the safety scissors but could not quite figure it out. She loves using the glue stick though. Then she enjoyed putting Peter Rabbit stickers on another piece of construction paper. She loves stickers!




Trying to play with the play- dough. She is not really into touching the play dough but we are trying. She is not a girl that likes to get her hands dirty that is for sure. She is a girly girl all the way!

Karoline LOVES to color and she is using her new crayons and coloring book she got with her birthday gift card from Uncle Jared, Aunt Sarah, and Ella.

These are her "spy glasses". She got the new Dora spy DVD for her birthday and now her sunglasses are spy glasses. She HAS to have them at ALL times. Yes, they are upside down.

She did take the spy glasses off for a moment to put them on Whisper.

Tonight while TJ was at rehearsal I dried her hair with a hair dryer. I knew if TJ was home he probably would not let me since he is so protective over his little girls hair and her curls (he has to be the one to brush it after her bath, if I do it he says I don't do it correctly!). It was so cute though... not as curly but precious!

Anderson playing while I get Karoline ready for bed! Sorry there are not a lot of pics of him today... I'll make up for it Easter Sunday I promise.

Video
Here is a video of Anderson rolling over!!! He is rolling over consistently now! I am so proud of him and please excuse my voice on the video... I was so excited because it was the first time I actually saw him roll over. The end of the video is Karoline saying her verse for the month. She is being shy on the video so she is not really speaking up... sorry! It's still very cute though...

Rolling Over, Sweet Potatoes, Banana's- BUSY MONDAY!

We have had a busy Monday but a fun Monday. I cleaned the house most of the day and yet by 8 PM it didn't look like it had been cleaned at all! How does that happen!!!??? I have spent most of my evening with my camera trying to figure it out. This is what I know so far... just keep it on AUTO! Hehe... I have tried to figure some things out but I really need someone to teach me. Maybe soon.
Anderson apparently rolled over from his back to his stomach last night when I was at Bible study. He tried to do it again today but could not quite get over. I am so sad I missed it but I am proud of him. He also still hates rice cereal. So I tried sweet potato since I had made some for Karoline and he loves it. I am going to try avocado in two weeks. He still only eats about 1 tablespoon and takes a few sips of water. He is also starting to not need his third nap of the day. Today he did without it and he did great. His morning nap and afternoon nap are getting longer finally. He still wakes up half way through and cries for a few minutes but goes back to sleep for another hour or so. He is enjoying being more active on the floor with his toys and his excersaucer. But he still loves just being held by me or watch basketball with TJ.
Karoline is great and has needed a little more discipline than normal but I think it is because we have been really busy lately and a little cold so she has not been able to go outside and play as much but today was beautiful so she did enjoy the great outdoors.
This girl LOVES to wear my shoes!


YUMMY Banana!!




My Baby Boy...

New Toys...

NOT FOR THE KIDS.... FOR US!

TJ got himself a new guitar... another Fender. He loves it of course. These pictures where taken a few weeks ago and I forgot to post them (TJ's dad and my dad will be the most interested).


My new Toy... I got a Canon Rebel XTI!! I LOVE LOVE LOVE it!!! After going back and forth between the Rebel and the Nikon D40 I choose the Rebel... Mainly because I have always had Canon cameras and I am familiar with their menus and formats and I have a 35mm Rebel. Anyway, I have not been able to play with it much. I really want to KNOW how to use it so I am going to study the manual. My friend Summer suggested an online class so I might look into that once Anderson is a little older and I have some "me" time. My hope is to be able to do photography on the side one day... Anyway, these are the pictures I took right after the UPS man, Mike, dropped it off (yes Mike and I are on a first name basis... online shopping is much cheeper than driving my big Expedition all around the Bay Area since gas is $3.60+ a gallon!).











This has NOTHING to do with the title of this post but I have to share again another cute thing Karoline said tonight. We have started working on one memory verse for her a month and this months verse is Ps. 34:1 "I will exalt the Lord at all times. His praise is always on my lips". We say it before her nap and before bed. So tonight we said the verse and I was walking out of the room and she says "Exalt again mommy". She wanted to say her verse again!! My heart melted. So we said it again. How precious!

**Also, IT'S A GIRL!! My great friend Emily and her husband Ryan are having another baby GIRL! Avery is going to have a little sister! I am so thrilled for them and that means Anderson is going to have a girl friend!**

Pretend Play

I have to document what Karoline was doing today while we were playing in her room (Anderson was asleep). She would get Baby Huggums put her in her bed, cover her up, and put her face up against Huggums and say "Thank you Jesus, Amen" (I always put my nose to her nose at night and say "Thank you Jesus for my little girl... prayer... Amen")
If that wasn't cute enough she would leave the room saying "Night night" then a moment later open the door and say "Good morning". She then would take Baby Huggums to her "kitchen" and put her in the high chair and would say "Okay, lets eat oatmeal" (what Karoline eats every day)... THEN when Huggums was finished Karoline would literally clean up the kitchen putting all the food and bowls away and then start over... she did this about 5 times!!!
After this we pulled out her other doll which has a few outfits and make up and changed her outfit about 100 times and after each outfit change we had to do her make up too of course! Oh and Karoline enjoyed putting make up on me too! It was a fun morning.
I do love to watch her play with her dolls and really get involved in her pretend play. Each day she makes me smile SO BIG! I LOVE my baby girl so much!

Video, Pics, Doc Appt.Change, Funny Conversation with Daddy, and Blurb

This video is of Karoline mostly, but I did get a little bit of Anderson. She got a Dora tattoo this weekend (removable of course) and at first she was so scared. We had been playing with stickers all day, putting them on our faces, the kitchen floor (which was funny until I tried to get them up), on sticker books, etc so I thought she would love the tattoo but she was so scared of it because it would not come off. After a little while she grew to love it and now I think she is going to be sad when it comes off. TJ's been a little jealous because he wants to get a guitar on his arm and I will KILL him if he does. Anyway, at the end of the video she is playing in the tub and I know it kind of goes on and on but she was making me laugh SO hard!!! Hope you get a few laughs yourself...

Here are some pictures from the past few days...
Playing with play- dough... YES I HATE play-dough but I still have to let my kids play with it!

Using a sippy cup with some water for the first time... he did pretty good. He still will only eat 4 bites of rice cereal and about 5 or 6 sips of water. He is adjusting to solids a lot slower than Karoline.

Their first bath together...

We dusted off the exersaucer and Anderson loves it!

Stickers on the floor... funny for a moment until I was on my hands and knees trying to get them off!

Karoline was sitting on Whisper reading books. I snuck to get the camera to take a picture but she saw me and dropped the book. The crazy thing is that she had been sitting on him for like 5 minutes and he never moved.


*The doctor called today and he is sick! Karoline 2 year and Anderson's 4 month appointments were tomorrow until they canceled on me so I won't get their STATS until April 2nd (he will be closer to 6 months by then but oh well!).

Conversation with Daddy:
This morning when TJ got Karoline up this is what their conversation was about:
K: "Hi Daddy, watch PTI" (Pardon the Interruption which is a show on ESPN)
TJ: "PTI is not on right now Karoline"
K: "How bout football?"
TJ: "There is no football on right now."
K: "How bout basketball?
TJ: "There is no basketball on right now."
k: "How bout NASCAR?"
TJ: "There is no NASCAR on right now."
TJ then came to me and said he was so proud to be her daddy!!

BLURB

I LOVE to journal, scrapbook, and document things. I have been like this for as long as I remember... I still have journals from 4th and 5th grade when I had HUGE crushes on my brother's football team friends. I have tons of journals from high school and college. I have TONS of scrapbooks too... one for ever stage of life it seems. BUT since I have had children I have stopped journaling and I am behind on my scrapbooking... but I HAVE started blogging! It is a LOT faster than writing in a journal or scrapbooking plus I do love being able to bring a smile to my mom's face a few times a week and to the others of you who read/ look at our blog. But I want to keep all this stuff... so Lyndsey introduced me to Blurb (www.blurb.com). You can download your blog and it will make it into a book! I LOVE THIS...

So I downloaded last year's blog postings (I figure I'll get a book printed each year) and it was 400+ pages!!!!!! That's write... LOTS of blogging! Anyway, I wanted to pass it on for you mom's who are like me and don't have time to scrapbook every event that happens in your child's life. Prices are great too really... I think my big book is going to be around $70. Not too bad...
Thanks Lyndsey for the tip!!

The San Francisco Zoo

Friday we went to the San Francisco Zoo. After driving all through the city and picking up Natalie and ER at their hotel we finally made it and the girls had a good time... Enjoy the pictures and video (it's short but funny to watch Karoline FREAK OUT over being close to the animals)...

The girls were ready to go and see all the animals.

Karoline LOVED the giraffe's the best for sure!

Anderson was sucking his thumb and the bib at the same time! So cute...

I think Emma Raines and Avery could possibly have a future working with Animals but NOT Karoline...

What a cute little boy... he liked being held by Emily while I tried to get Karoline to pet the animals...

Avery was trying to get Karoline to help brush the goats but NO WAY... Karoline would not dare touch!

While ER and Avery were having a grand old time at the petting zoo Karoline really would not even get close to the animals...

Karoline did enjoy sitting on the tractor though...

This STUPID BIRD!!! We were eating a nice quiet picnic when this bird started getting closer to Karoline I thought it was cute so I got up real quickly to grab the camera and it flew onto our table in front of Karoline and ATE Karoline's PB&J!!!!!!!!!!!! Karoline was mortified!!!! She was so scared and I felt so bad for her. She was fine a few minutes later but it was sad!

Happy now sitting with Avery...

Me, Karoline, Natalie, and Emma Raines

So cute holding hands...

Looking at the tigers (ER was fast asleep during the tigers... maybe that is because Wayne is an Alabama graduate!)

The Animals

This funny animal digs a hole and sits in it... it is so strange!

Sleeping Koala...

Funny bears...

Sad story... Natalie thought this tiger was tearing up a stuffed animal and Emily had to inform her that nope, it was a bunny rabbit! SO SAD! But I guess tigers have to eat too...

Sleepy lion... man I wish I could have taken a nap like most of the animals!



It was a fun day but man I was SO tired when it was over!!
Okay, it's been a fun blogging week but I think I am going to go on blogging vacation for a few days! Sorry mom...