Spring is in the air!!

The trees are budding, the daffodils are blooming, and it's supposed to be 81 degrees tomorrow!! That can only mean that spring is FINALLY here!! WHO HOO!! This winter has seemed as though it would never end, and we couldn't be happier to see the signs of spring.

Grace LOVES to be outside, and is happy playing in the dirt and running in the trees (in our neighbor's yard). This past weekend, Matt got in his first mow of the season but not before Grace "helped" him get the lawnmower ready to go. It wouldn't surprise me at all if she follows Matt's footsteps and becomes an engineer. As you can see from the pictures, she was all about "helping" Matt change the oil and sharpen the blade! She likes to get dirty and would've been rolling around in the oil if we would've let her! I'm sure I'll have some pictures to post of Grace following Matt with her bubble mower over the next few weeks.

Grace had her second experience coloring Easter eggs yesterday afternoon. She was very patient as we waited for the tablets to melt. However, she didn't seem to understand that you need to GENTLY place the eggs in each cup, WAIT a few minutes before taking them out, and then WAIT until they dry before touching them! :)

We had a few mishaps when one fell on the floor and two were......well crushed. Grace did pretty well overall and even made a pink and blue egg for the baby! Out of the 12 eggs we colored, I think we were able to keep 9 of them! Not too shabby for a little punkin' head!

We're looking forward to a visit from Grandma and a fun Easter weekend!!

Fun in Pigeon Forge

It's Spring Break time, and that means our house is getting lots of visitors! Brent, Laura, and Jack stayed with us last Saturday on their way down to Pigeon Forge. They took off on Sunday to stay in a cabin in the mountains, and Grace and I got to spend the day with them on Wednesday. We drove down to Pigeon Forge to "the strip" and met up with the Townsends at a complex that has race cars and all kinds of rides for the kids. Grace and Jack ate it up and hopped from one ride to the next. Jack was very patient with Grace and pretty much let her navigate the way. Grace wasn't intimidated at all by the rides. In fact, she was quite bored on the carousel and the train. She perked up after we found the swings and ferris wheel......where Laura and I have never laughed so hard in our entire lives. I wish my pictures of her swinging did the situation justice, but they just don't. Once the swings started, she wouldn't move a muscle (but had a smile on her face) and I mean to tell you it was absolutely HYSTERICAL!! After an hour or two, we went to Calhoun's for lunch and back to the cabin for Grace's nap. A mere hour-long nap later, and we were back at it and riding away!

That evening we had our first Dixie Stampede experience! I knew Grace would like it because of the live horses, but I didn't know if she would hold up for the full hour and a half show and the food situation. For those of you who don't know, you are served food (a chicken, half of a baked potato, soup, etc.) and NO utensils. I knew in advance what food we would be served so I went ahead and packed a whole slew of food options for Grace. All I can say is that she absolutely LOVED it!!! She clapped, cheered, and yelled the entire time!! Laura and I were busting a gut watching her. During the last 5 minutes or so, she acted like she wanted to walk around. But Laura held her for the finale and all was well! We even got to pet the horses after the show!

Our biggest obstacle was getting Grace out of the gift shop on the way out!

We had such a fun day! The weather was perfect. The kids got to play all day. We had our first Dixie Stampede experience.....all with great company! Come back and visit anytime! Here are some pictures........

Nana and Papa also spent the night with us on their way home from Florida. We didn't get to spend much time with them, but we did manage to squeeze in some block building, a makeup session with Nana, a great cookout, some house hunting, and a win for the "Dawgs!" When we sat down to get some pictures, Grace wanted nothing to do with the camera. So, unfortunately, we don't have any pictures of Nana and Pap.

This weekend we're excited that Grandma is staying with us for a long weekend and will be spending Easter with us! I can't wait to see what Grace thinks of her Easter egg hunt this year!!

Happy Birthday, Daddy!!

HAPPY

BIRTHDAY

DADDY!!

Here's Grace's special rendition of the birthday song! She gets a little choked in the end, but she makes a nice recovery! :)

It's been a POOPY day!!

We had a first in the potty training department today. Grace had a little accident right after she sat on the potty. This incident was very similar to potty training a puppy. For those who have been through that, you'll know exactly what I mean. Your puppy finds a good spot, starts circling, and then before you know what happened, there's a huge mess on the floor. This is exactly what happened with Grace today. She JUST got off the potty and we headed to her room to get a pull-up. She got behind her bed, gave me a weird look, and squatted! Her first response was, "Oh Mommy, poopies!" I couldn't help but laugh!! And it all happened in the blink of an eye. So instead of flipping out, I decided to get a video of it to eventually show her when she's 16! HAHAHA! The first video is immediately after "the incident".....I was SO happy I had my phone sitting on her bed. The second video is showing Grace "helping" me clean up the mess. Enjoy!!

I finally broke down and did it......

Our trips to the grocery store are becoming more and more difficult the older that Miss Independent gets. I try to make these trips as fast as possible, but let's face it, sometimes you just need to load up on all of those snacks, frozen items, etc. that you don't need on a weekly basis. I can usually keep her content with her bowl of bushies (goldfish), but that only lasts until around the 4th aisle when Grace wants to start opening everything I put in the cart.

Kroger usually has samples around the produce and deli areas. The samples can range from apples and pineapple to cheese, ham and olives. Grace starts saying, "apples, Mommy" as soon as we pull into the parking spot so you can bet I say a little prayer that we'll walk in and see those waiting for us! Believe me I know it's going to be a good day when Kroger has their apples out....it's the little things in life people! :) You see I can get two pieces of the apples and that tends to last Grace until the midway point of our shopping trip. At that point, I'll call an intermission, run back over to the produce, get one more sample, and finish our trip without too many problems.

And then there are the days when Kroger has NO samples at all!! Grace's reaction can range anywhere from completely fine to "Mommy hold you" as soon as we hit the produce section......NOT GOOD!!

Enough rambling and onto the point I'm trying to make. Like any other grocery store, Kroger has the carts with the car attached for kids to ride in. Grace sees them and points them out every time we're there. However, I was VERY hesitant about letting her get in one since I knew there would be no going back to the "regular" shopping cart. Well today was a day that I needed to load up on all the extra groceries and I knew it would be a long shopping trip. I decided to break down and let Grace try it out. Before all you germaphobic family members and friends cringe at the thought of letting your child ride in one of these, please know that I wiped down the entire car with Lysol wipes! Now just take a deep breath! :) Much to my surprise, there was a seatbelt in the car!! YES, she couldn't escape!! She did great until we got to the soup aisle and I heard the dreaded, "down Mommy" coming from the car! I had to start pulling out some Indy 500 moves to keep her entertained, but overall she did pretty good. So what if she didn't eat a good lunch due to the bushies, pineapple, and Cheerios she ate while shopping. And maybe Grace was even laying completely sideways yelling, "down, Mommy, down" by the time we finally paid. It could've been worse, right!?!?

My next approach is to let Grace walk and use the mini-carts that are perfect for her size. However, I'm sure our shopping trips will get at least an hour longer and cost quite a bit more (after she starts putting all kinds of goodies in her cart) after we start that! :) I'll keep you all posted on how that goes!

My observant and honest toddler

Grace is extremely observant about the world these days, and as any toddler would be, is VERY honest about what she sees. During my pregnancies, I develop skin pigmentation issues that result from spider veins bursting from the extra blood that's flowing through my body. I started noticing little red places on my face around my 5th - 6th month of my first pregnancy. They started to spead like chicken pox and by the end of my pregnancy they were on my face, chest, arms, and hands. It wasn't too bad since I could cover most of them up with my winter maternity clothes. Everyone told me not to worry and they would disappear after I gave birth. This was only PARTIALLY true since a few spots still remained on my face.

During this pregnancy, the dreaded "red spots" started making their appearance earlier than my 5th month! This is leading me to the point of this post. This morning, Grace was in the bathroom with me standing on her step stool "helping" me put on my makeup. I leaned down close to her face to give her some sponges when she looked at me and said, "Mommy are you alright? Did you hurt yourself?" It took me a minute to figure out that she was talking about my POLKA-DOTTED face!! Poor thing! You should've seen how concerned she looked. After a lengthy explanation that included pregnancy, babies, and birth, she looked a bit confused but quickly changed the subject.

Can the warm weather PLEASE come NOW so I can get some sun on this pasty white skin and my daughter won't think I'm bleeding from my face!! It should be an interesting pregnancy since I obviously won't be able to cover up my chest and arms in the dead heat of summer!

And one more thing.......Grace now sleeps with a pillow in her bed. She has always been a child that likes to bury her head when she sleeps. So you can only imagine how she can worm her way into a cuddly pillow and wake up with a fantastic set of bed head. Yesterday after her nap, I instantly started cracking up when I went to get her after she woke up. Check out the pics to see for yourself! We needed more than a little Johnson's Detangler to get rid of that bird's nest!!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Happy St. Patrick's Day from Knoxville!!

While some people look for a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, we simply look for a pot o' goldfish!! Ok that was bad wasn't it!! HAHAHAHA! Have a green beer for me people!

Updates......

It's been a while since my last post, and I have some updates to pass along.

Potty Training:

I am happy to report that Grace is starting to get this whole potty training thing!! She had 3 successes during the first week, and I thought we were going to have to put it on the back burner again. But much to my surprise, she started going more frequently and now will go (or at least try) every time we sit her on the potty!!! HOORAY GRACIE!! At first, we would hear just a little come out and then we would all get so excited the rest would never make its way out. But now, she is an old pro and will get most of her potty out!! She isn't to the point of telling us when she has to go, but we're getting closer!! I think Grace's favorite part of potty training is when she flushes the potty, washes her hands, and then streaks across the house!! HAHAHAHA!! I never get tired of seeing that little toosh bee-bopping around!!

Moving Update:

For those of you who don't know, we put our house up for sale on Monday, February 22nd. We had 2 showings that Wednesday and got an offer from the first person who came through our house!! Here's the catch.......we don't have any place to go!! The buyer initially wanted to close on March 24th, but settled on the following terms. We have 14 days (until March 12th) to find a house for us or she can walk away from the contract......no pressure there!! Sure we could always go to an apartment and put our stuff in storage while we find a house that meets our needs. But, quite frankly, I would rather poke myself in the eyeballs than have to move twice......especially being pregnant and having a 2 year old to take care of. Can you all understand where I'm coming from here?!?!? So, we have been looking at houses almost daily trying to find what we're looking for. We found a couple that we were interested in, but other buyers got to them before we could. I have my fingers, toes, arms, and legs crossed hoping that we'll find our next home by Friday!!

Pregnancy:

My pregnancy is moving right along. I can't believe this baby is already half-cooked! We had our big ultrasound today. And we're having a..........................................................

did you all think we would cave and find out!?!?!?!? Well we didn't, but dang that is tempting when you're in the ultrasound room! The ultrasound went great! The baby weighs 11oz now and all his/her anatomical parts looked and measured right on!! We got to see a little face, tiny feet, and a hand waving at us. The poor little booger had the hiccups too! There is nothing more amazing than seeing your baby up on that screen and knowing that in 4 short months we'll actually be holding him/her!! I'm feeling LOTS of little movements now and my appetite has hit the roof. I decided to take belly shots every month during this pregnancy and will post those here soon.

I wanted to pass along a couple pictures of Grace. She LOVES school buses and starts screaming "cool bus" every time she sees one. Much to my amazement, there was a "cool bus" parked outside Kroger a couple weeks ago as we were leaving from our weekly shopping trip. The driver was nice enough to let us on board so I could show Grace the inside. She got to check it out and sit in an actual "cool bus" seat! She wasn't too thrilled until we got back in our car. It must've taken a few minutes to sink in because on our way home all she kept saying was, "I sat in cool bus mommy!" The top picture is Grace standing on the cool bus steps!

Grace's finger ends up in her nost A LOT these days. Her usual response to me telling her to "please remove your finger from your nost before I vomit" is exactly what you see in the second picture!!