iPhone Dump

James sent me this a few weekends ago when I was at speech with Knox. Yes, that would be Hadley in one of her brother’s shirts and a fireman hat, playing with Legos. Kind of cute but I’m glad they didn’t go anywhere. That I know of…

  

I’m still deciding which of the kids’ Spring Pictures I want in prints and galleries, but I knew right away I wanted a big classic canvas of this one. I ordered an 18x24 and I couldn’t be any more pleased with it! I just hung it over the mantle for now but once we get in the new house I’ll have it framed and most likely hang it in the dining room.

One of the few advantages of our stent in the townhome is the pool! It has 3 levels just like this with flowing waterfalls from each and several mini pools. It’s gorgeous and I intend to take full advantage before the move. We took the kids for the first time on Cinco de Mayo…

  

All of our puddle jumpers and floaties are buried somewhere in the storage unit. We had to watch them like hawks.

We LOOOVE living by a TCBY now. It’s becoming at least a once a week treat :)

Some of y’all asked - I found Hadley’s head phones for the iPad at Toys-R-Us. They limit the volume amount according to age. The youngest age they had was 3-5yrs but they fit H just fine on the smallest setting. I need to get Knox a pair so they can wear them while watching DVDs in the car and I can listen to something ANYTHING else.

  

I got 5 inches of hair cut off right before we went to Knoxville! I took the Before pic on the left but it’s taken me a while to get used to my new hair so I didn’t take an After picture right away. You can kind of see the length in the picture on the right and it slightly angles up in the back like a graduated bob… I think I’m starting to get the hang of it??? If anything it’s SO much quicker to dry.

Hadley went potty like a big girl for the first time a few weeks ago (20.5months). I don’t want to full-on potty train until after the move, but she’s real in to princesses right now so she got the biggest kick out of picking out her first pairs of princess panties… A right of passage for every little girl ;)

A few more H updates since I’m slacking on the monthly posts…

  

{L} We had a follow-up appointment with Dr. B for her hemangioma. She’s had 3 laser treatments and it looks 300 times better than it did 6 months ago! Dr. B thinks there’s still room for improvement and she does so well with the treatments, we’re going to do a few more. (Not to mention we’ve met out deductible on her!) The next one will be on June 5th.

{R} Hadley started climbing out of her crib this week. She surprised me Tuesday morning by waltzing in to our room wearing her shoes and saying Hi, Mama! I honestly thought it’d happen before 18 months since she’s such a climber, but I guess she’s always known her bed as an “enclosure” so the thought of climbing out never occurred to her until now…

Oh mercy… I posted this earlier on Twitter/Facebook, but I just can’t get over how old Hadley looks here! I mean, all she needs is a bag over her shoulder and a phone in her hand and she’d look like she was off to the clubs. Very rarely do I put her in big girl outfits for that very reason. The only reason she wore this is because she’d already gone through 2 outfits and I just wasn’t in the mood for her to dirty up another hang-to-dry one.

Although I admit, it IS pretty darn cute… But she has forever to wear jeans and tunic tops. Her days of bubbles and bishops are limited :( Soooooo…

We compensated the next day :)

  

Now there’s my itty bitty baby!!!

I’ll have a BIG update in store for this guy very soon. The count-down is ON…

12 days ‘til he’s the big F-O-UR! He’s just a little bit excited ;) We have some fun things in store. I’d say ‘I can’t wait.’ but I really can because I’m in total denial that I’m old enough to have a 4 year old… Wow.

Lastly, we close in less than 3 weeks but we’re having to renegotiate the price on the house due to the appraisal. We knew this was a possibility due to it being an older home in a desirable location. I’m just praying we can get it worked out with little to know haggling… We’ve been caught up in the real estate world for 5 months, I’m SO over haggling!

Rocky Top Part 2 & Mother’s Day

After the graduation ceremony on Friday we ate lunch at the pizza place where Mandy works - Sergeant Pepperonis. Seriously some of the best pizza I’ve ever had!

Can you guess who shared the spotlight with Aunt Mandy this weekend? I’m glad I was able to bring H along with me. She’s gotten a lot less family time than Knox had. Most of my family hadn’t seen her since Christmas - that’s like a third of her life! She ate up the extra attention.

Mom and Nick drove us back to the Nashville for our flight home Friday afternoon.

Hadley got a decent nap on the way there but considering her lack of sleep it wasn’t nearly enough.

We killed some time at the Opry Mills mall once we got to Nashville. Our flight home wasn’t until 7:30, putting us in around 9:40. Yuck! So you can imagine my excitement once I checked in at the airport around 6 and the guy told me he could put us on the 6:30 flight back… I thought it was just the luckiest day ever since that would put us home around 8 and Hadley’s fuse was already running short.

We RAN through security and rushed to grab a quick “dinner” (a banana, water, and box of Frosted Mini Wheats), and then it was time to board…

I was not excited about our new seat in the back of the plane, but hey… An earlier flight is an earlier flight, right?

We were on the runway, engines ready for take-off when the pilot announced that there was bad weather moving through back home and it would delay us 30 minutes… Which turned in to another 30 minutes, which turned in to 45 minutes, and so on and so forth. Our “6:30” flight didn’t take off until 9pm, so you can just imagine how sweet, hungry, over-tired Hadley dealt with that…

Awful! She was the only little one on the flight and I’m always so paranoid about being THAT mom and kid that everyone dreads… I felt like part clown part wrestler pulling everything I could think of out of my bag trying to keep her calm. She really never had an all out melt-down she just fought everything… She wanted to walk, but didn’t want me to put her down. She wanted a snack but didn’t want me to open it. She wanted to watch a show, but not really…. There aren’t enough DumDums or apps in the world to prepare for that.

I’m so thankful that the flight attendants and other passengers were very understanding with us. Everyone was irritated about the delay but I think more than anything they just felt sorry for us. It was obvious that it was WAY past H’s bedtime and that I was doing any and everything humanly possible to pacify her.

It was rough, but we survived and as soon as we took off she passed out like I knew she would. I had to go to the bathroom from the moment we got on the plane but didn’t get a chance while dealing with her and once she fell asleep I didn’t dare wake her up, so I was pretty much miserable the entire flight.

But anyway - on top of the initial delay, the pilot spent 45 minutes circling the airport until he was cleared to land and we waited another 45 for an open gate. By the time I got off that plane it was past 11 and I was too claustrophobic, exhausted, and hungry for words…

James and Knox were waiting for us at baggage claim. Knox’s reaction when he saw us *almost* made it all better. He ran up and gave me a hug, then he and Hadley had a 5 minute hugging/giggle fest. It was priceless. If I hadn’t been so delirious I probably would have gotten pics ;)

We hit a traffic jam for night construction on the way home and had to stop for gas so it was 1am before we got to bed. Nuts!

My kids usually do really well flying but there’ve been about 3 or 4 other times when we’ve been delayed like this and it just seems to be one nightmare after another… Although, I do believe the fact that it was Mother’s Day weekend worked in my favor. People are usually pretty helpful whenever they see me juggling kids/strollers/bags, but they were exceptionally so this trip… I didn’t once have to worry about lifting my bags or folding/unfolding the stroller, security let me slide on a few unauthorized liquids I’d forgotten about and let us bypass the jumbo x-ray machine, and we received so many words of encouragement from strangers, especially on that rough ride home… I hope I remember that one day when my kids are grown and I get stuck next to the mom with the cranky kid ;)

Needless to say Saturday and Sunday were spent recuperating for H and me. James let me sleep in and Hadley took some looong naps. I don’t think I did one single productive thing Saturday. I was pretty lazy Sunday too but I did catch up on some laundry and cleaning. I know - cleaning on Mother’s Day… But I told James it actually was a “treat” because since he had the kids I was able to get to the things that never get done.

{The kids played dress-up all day Sunday. James sent me this picture. Cutest little pirate and princess there ever were!}

For Mother’s Day my crew surprised me with a new Tiffany’s necklace Knox picked out himself. He was so proud of it! Melts my heart…

We went out to eat Sunday night at a local Italian place. Yummy food made by someone else and a night off cleaning the kitchen is always a present in and of itself :)

I love sharing my first mommy pictures every year, so here’s Knox and me…

May 29, 2008 - Literally, the MOMENT I became a mommy.

And Hadley…

August 20, 2010 - Precious, precious girl! I remember before she was born worrying I wouldn’t be able to love another child as much as I did Knox. It’s amazing how your heart grows and loves each one differently but somehow equally.

I can’t believe I just celebrated my 4th Mother’s Day (well technically that first one I was VERY pregnant with Knox…) and that I have 2 kids that are as big and wonderful as they are. I feel like the luckiest mommy ever :)

Rocky Top Graduation: Part 1

Hadley and I took a mini girls trip this week to see my little sister Mandy graduate from the University of Tennessee. She’s starting medical school in the fall so we are especially proud of her! I’m so glad we got to go, but it was a 36 hour WHIRLWIND…

Thursday morning James and Knox dropped us off at the airport. I took Hadley because she and I haven’t had a lot of one-on-one time, and she’s almost never had one-on-one time with my family. Plus she’s under 2 and flies free ;)

I felt guilty telling Knox he wasn’t going this time though - he and I have done A LOT of flying in his lifetime. He was disappointed but I have no doubts he had a lot more fun with Dad…

James took him to work Thursday and Friday!

     

He loved getting to see the big buildings and rail stations downtown. He watched Batman, drew pictures, went on runs to see clients, bugged Mr. Braden, and I’m told the stained concrete floors in the office are just right for his RC Lightening McQueen. He’s under the impression that he’s going back with James Monday morning so breaking that to him should be a fun conversation…

As for H and I - our non-stop flight to Nashville was on time and easy-breezy. We scored a 9th row seat by the sweetest Nana-aged lady.

Hadley did great!

  

Although we did have a little help from modern-day technology… How did our parents survive without these things???

My Dad picked us up in Nashville, we grabbed a quick lunch then made our way to Knoxville. H napped most of the 3 hour drive…

Tennessee hill country.

   

The stacking cups and iPad turned out to be lifesavers on this trip.

My mom, brother, and other little sister were driving in from Memphis so we all met up at Mandy’s house then went out for a nice dinner at The Copper Cellar to celebrate.

Sister Kim, brother Nick, my Dad, and Mandy.

We went back to Mandy’s house for gifts and that’s where my camera started acting funky…

:-/

iPhone pics from her on out, and looks like I’ll be making a trip to Wolf Camera this week.

Mom, Hadley and I didn’t get to our hotel room until midnight. H napped on the way but once we got there and were ready for bed she found her second wind… AGGHHH! Just imagine a pitch-dark hotel room at 12:30am and Hadley climbing out of the Pack-N-Play and bouncing off the walls… Can we say over-stimulated???

I knew the only way she’d settle down is if I ignored her and pretended I was asleep. She caught on pretty quick and started doing ANYTHING to get my attention… Counting, singing rounds of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, saying MaMa? Love you! MaaMaaaaa??? LOVE YOOUUU… and even climbing on top of my head and giving me kisses. Seriously…

But somehow we both DID finally fall asleep and it was a good thing considering we had to be up early to get ready and be on campus for the 8am graduation.

 

FYI - The Press Here app is a GREAT diversion for even the littlest ones. I’m a big fan.

I snuck up front to get a picture of her walking. If only I’d had a working camera and telephoto lens :-/

Hadley did really well, but since Thursday and Friday were both looong days full of sitting, waiting, riding, and very little sleep I took her out to run off some steam after Mandy walked…

 

We don’t get many opportunities to wear a Vol orange cheerleader bishop in Texas, so I told Mandy I’d let the hem out and she’d be wearing it to her UT medical school graduation :)

A gorgeous day on Rocky Top! Although I believe it was chillier there than it was in Texas all winter. My thin blood isn’t used to the 60s… Ha!

Nick, H, and I with Neyland in the background. I realized that the last time I was here was over six years ago when I was cheering… #old

She made Nick and Poppy do this for a good 30 minutes. So funny!

We came back in for closing ceremonies.

Congrats Vols Class of 2012!

Mandy and Abby. It really does seem like just yesterday they graduated from high school. Exactly FOUR years ago…

This picture from her high school graduation is so weird to me. It was also Mother’s Day weekend and I was just days away from being a mom for the first time… That’s little Knox in my belly!

Sibling photo op. Wish I’d thought to put my big honkin’ travel diaper bag down for pictures.

Not-so-much my baby sister anymore… Somehow she survived years of torture and being my “slave” and now she’s gonna be a doctor. You’re welcome, sis :)

  

Roomies.

Lack of sleep finally catching up with the late night party girl ;)

Ok so, that’s enough pictures for one post, right?? I’ll share the rest of our trip later.

Happy Mother’s Day!!!