Christmas in Texas

We went to Texas for the weekend to have Christmas with MiMi and Grandad.  We were so excited to get to eat MiMi's famous irish potato casserole and chocolate pie that the food alone was worth the trip!  Wm was excited to get to open more presents, and he sure got some good ones!

First trip on my new scooter...it's going to take a little practice!

Dad and Grandad hunted on Sunday morning and had a great hunt.  They got their limit pretty quickly and killed every kind of duck except a mallard.  They had a great time, and Wm loved getting to see the ducks when they got home.  Won't be long before he gets to go, too!

It was such a fun and relaxing weekend, the perfect ending to our holiday week.  Now, we're back in the real world...Dad is working today, Wm and I are headed to the grocery store and will take down Christmas decorations this afternoon.  Ugh.

Welcome to the world, Greenlee!

The morning after Christmas, my phone rang around 7:30 am, and Wm and I had just rolled out of bed and were still in a haze.  It was my friend, Whitney, telling me her water broke at 2:15 that morning and they were at the hospital.  I'm awake now!  Her due date was January 8th, so Greenlee was coming two weeks early.  I got dressed, went to the hospital, waited with her family and friends until Greenlee Elizabeth was born at 12:26pm.  The baby had to spend a little time in NICU, and I had to get to Texas to have Christmas with MiMi and Grandad, so I didn't get to meet that precious bundle until Sunday afternoon.  She weighed 9 lbs. 11 oz. and was 21 inches long.  One of the nurses said yesterday that she witnessed one of Greenlee's fits in the nursery and boy, was she a drama queen.  Like mother like daughter!  She is absolutely precious, and we are so excited she is here.  Mom and baby are doing well and will get to go home Monday afternoon.  Welcome little punkin, we love you!

Auntie Elizabeth

Would you look at those cheeks????

Mommy Whitney, Elizabeth, me, and Emily

Santa Came!

William must have been a good boy this year because Santa came and was sooooo good to him. He miraculously slept until 7:30 on Christmas morning.  Dad and I went to get him out of bed, we checked to make sure Santa ate his cookies and drank his milk (which he did), and then we were off to the Christmas tree!  

Love my teepee...

And my Mommy.

William shot a lot of ducks on Christmas morning.  He's since shot a couple of monsters, too. :)

Oh boy, an orange in my stocking.

This teddy bear is bigger than Wm and is almost as heavy.  Wm has named him Bingo, and he sleeps by Wm's bed at night.

Battle of the bellies....

Yes, my stomach is bigger than Anne's, and yes, she's due 4 weeks before I am.  I've measured 3 weeks ahead of schedule at my last two appointments.  Dr. Cope assures me I'll either even out over the next few weeks or I'll just have a really big baby.  I guess that's one good thing about having a c-section. :)

Christmas was a great day.  We had a fun filled morning followed by a yummy lunch at Anne's house, no naps (even for little Wm), A Christmas Story movie, and candy filled bellies at the end of the day.  Now, if I can just get those little elves to come and take down all my Christmas things...

Ready for Christmas!

Well, we haven't fallen off the face of the earth, it's just been a busy month.  Daddy William has been hunting a lot, hiking, and mostly working his tail off at the office.  I've been busying around with Christmas stuff and POTTY TRAINING.  We're at the beginning of week #3, and so far....just okay.  We haven't had an accident in almost two whole days, which is an accomplishment. Patience is not a natural virtue of mine (thanks to my Dad), and being 7 1/2 months pregnant makes that fuse a LOT shorter....and I'll be the first to admit it wasn't long to begin with. Probably not a good combination with the whole potty training thing, but I didn't really feel like I had a choice unless I wanted to have two in diapers.  So, here we are.  

On a lighter note, here are a few pics I snapped while trying to get a Christmas card picture.  I ended up with a few cute ones.  William is super excited about Santa coming (unless I'm using it to bribe him to going to the bathroom in the potty, in which case he doesn't want Santa to come, but that's a whooooole different story)...all he has asked for is a race car with fire on it.  He showed it to me at Toys R Us so I could be sure and tell Santa exactly which one he wants.  I've asked him a few other times what Santa is going to bring, to which he replies "an orange."  How many?  "One for me, and one for Mommy, and one for Daddy."  I think he got the idea from a Christmas scents book that MiMi and Grandad gave him.  Anyway, our house is all ready for Santa, and we've all been good as gold.  Can't wait to see what he brings us!!

On a funny note, when Wm woke up this morning, I was telling him it was only 3 days until Christmas.  We've been trying to talk to him about what Christmas is really about and about when Jesus was born.  He asked me if baby Jesus was coming to Christmas, to which I responded "Jesus is always with you in your heart, but you can't see him."  Later, when I was putting him down for a nap, he started patting his tummy telling me Jesus was in there.  I corrected him and said, "No, that's your tummy, Jesus is in your heart."  And I moved his hand to his little heart.  Wm's reply was, "I can feel baby Jesus in there kicking my heart."  I'm assuming it was either the beating of the heart or the talk of the baby moving in Mommy's tummy.  Either way, I about fell over laughing.

3rd Birthday

I started off our weekend with a baby shower for my good friend, Whitney.  Somehow the four pictures that were taken with my camera were fuzzy, so I don't have anything to share from it. Hopefully, someone will forward me a picture, and I'll post it on here.  She got TONS of good stuff and looks so cute.  We can't wait to welcome that precious baby girl to the world!

Sunday was William's third birthday.  We started out the day with a trip to the donut shop. William picked out a glazed donut with white icing and sprinkles.  It took him ONE HOUR to eat the whole thing, but it was his birthday, so I didn't push.  He opened presents from Mom and Dad that morning and played until nap time.  We had a family birthday party Sunday night, which might sound small, but our families are so big, we had 24 people.  It was fun but absolute chaos!  William was completely wound up and did not sit still for one millisecond.

Ardie and Tattoo were such sweet troopers to come.  Mom had a party at her house the night before and Dad had been duck hunting all weekend with the Tedfords, so I know they were tired!

No, she's not my child, but everyone tells me she could pass for it.  She's my precious niece, Arden Clare, who is Ellis' youngest.  I have to admit, she really does look a whole lot like I did at that age, but her Mom and I looked a lot alike at respective ages, too.  She is the daintiest, girliest little thing you've ever seen, I could just eat her up.

William's tractor cake (from Mickey's, of course, the best cake place EVER).

William loved it when everybody sang Happy Birthday to him.  He even managed to sing a good bit of the song to himself.

MiMi and Grandad were so sweet to drive up from Texas, even though MiMi has practically been on the road for the last three weeks.  I'm sure she loved being in the car for 5 hours, but we sure were glad she and Grandad were here!

William has the best cousins in the world.  Really.  On both sides of the family.  Just to give you an example...Christopher (the one behind William with the orange hat on) won a giant tiger at the State Fair a few weeks ago.  You know those things are a treasure to any kid, I don't care how old you are.  Christopher wrapped it up and gave it to William for his birthday...along with a few baby lions.  William was sooooo excited, and I'm just so impressed that an almost 11 year old is that thoughtful.     

The picture doesn't do justice, but when I said it was pinata time, William, Mary Ellis, and Arden Clare were literally jumping up and down they were so excited to get candy.

I tried to blow up this picture of John, but didn't have much luck without distorting it.  The expression on his face is priceless and hysterical-if you can see it well enough, it really speaks for itself.  I think he gets the award for the most damage done to the pinata.

Scrambling to pick up the candy.

Loving my new tricycle!

And here is where sweet little Tollie spent most of the night...hand, chips, whatever she could get in the spinach dip.

This picture was at the end of the night, can you tell??  By the time the last person left, William said, "Momma, can I have a piece of my tractor cake now?"  That's right.  I didn't even give my poor child a piece of birthday cake at his own  birthday party.  It's not as bad as it sounds, though.  While everyone else was being served cake, William was opening presents, so he was distracted.  He managed to gulp down about 4 bites of cake and ice cream at 8:00, and then he was back to playing with all his new goodies.  We finally got him down after 9:00, and we were all pooped to say the least.  It was the best 3 year old birthday ever.  He is such a joy to us and has set the bar pretty high for the baby coming in February.  They just don't get much better than you, William, you've sure made your Mom and Dad proud!  Happy Birthday, Peanut, we love you!

Leaves, leaves, and more leaves

Boy, do I ever love this time of year!  It's getting cold, we are having fires in the fireplace, the leaves have turned........and then they all fall......in our yard.  Not only do we have loads of trees, but many of our neighbors' trees "hang" over into ours meaning we get everyone's leaves and then some.  Most days, it looks like it's raining leaves here.  In years past, it's been a two day job for both of us to get them all bagged.  We've finally gotten a method down and have managed to cut down on time, but it's still an exhausting job.  Little William loves to "swim" in the leaves and get lost in them.  He'll even put an occasional leaf or two in a bag to help Mom & Dad.  Today, every time he saw me with the camera, he would either turn his back to me or bury his face in the leaves, so I didn't get many pictures.  

At the end of a pretty long day, these are the sixty something bags we ended up with.  William insisted one of us be in the picture, but I assured him none of y'all wanted to see a tired old pregnant hag (nor do I want the proof).  So, he was the chosen one, though he looks like a little speck next to all those bags.  Sad thing is, we'll have to do it all again in another week or two.  :( Oh, the joys of home ownership.

Sheriff William

Whew, what a night!  This was William's first Halloween to really "get" the trick-or-treating thing.  It sure was fun, but am I ever pooped!  We were able to snap a few pictures at the beginning of the night, but between gear falling off, a Halloween party, trick-or-treating around the neighborhood, and eating our weight in candy, we didn't end up taking that many photos.

Ardie and Tattoo were in town for the occasion.

The three of us with William's rock-star Aunt Janie, Tattoo, great-grandmother A.E., and great Uncle Conner.

Give me some candy or I'll shoot.

We stopped to see Bowman early in the night.  I think William must have been experiencing a "sugar-low" at this point, based on his expressionless face.  I wanted to eat up that little owl...he is the cutest thing ever!  Wish I had gotten a better picture.

Then, it was off to a Halloween party at future girlfriend/Ladybug Gabriella's house.  I saw some hysterical costumes (mostly from the adults), but I didn't make it home with pictures of any of them.  We finished up the night trick-or-treating on our street.  By the time we got home, most of the trick-or-treaters had gone home....which means I still have a humongous bowl of candy (mostly chocolate) to mow through this week.  Any takers?

First "Real" Haircut

Don't let the title mislead you....William, at the ripe old age of "not quite three" has probably had more haircuts than I've had in my lifetime.  They've all been home jobs, courtesy of Mom, with the exception of the one Dad was allowed to do, but we won't revisit that nightmare. Anyway, this kid's hair is so thick, curly, coarse, and grows at a rate three times faster than my husband is losing his (where's the justice?).  I hate giving William haircuts, almost as much as he loathes getting them.  My friend, Melissa, just opened up a kid's salon called Pigtails and Crewcuts, so I thought I'd save us both the torture of another homegrown cut and check it out.  

I would be lying if I said he was all kicks and giggles, BUT for the first time ever, William did not cry, throw a fit, or wildly protest in any way shape or form.  He didn't even freak out when the nice lady used the electric razor to cut around his ears, which is major.  He was as still and as good as he could possibly have been!  He got to sit in an airplane chair, watch the Bee Movie, and eat animal crackers during the cut.  After it was over, he got to pick a prize from the treasure chest and he got a sucker!  Is that a fun haircut or what????  I have to give Melissa props for the great kid salon idea.  She will save me many hours of grief, so I owe her...and will pay her well for as long as William is young enough to visit her fabulous salon!

Carving Pumpkins

We carved our pumpkins from the pumpkin patch last night.  William was excited and had to bide his time playing with his cars in a nice dirt patch our dogs have created in the back yard until we were ready.  (On another note, is it any wonder I can't keep my house clean?  I have vacuumed my house so much that the wheels have literally fallen off of my vacuum cleaner, but the next time Daddy gives me grief, I will remind him of this picture).

And yes, that is the same child....the one who is rolling in the dirt doesn't like the icky pumpkin on his hands...go figure.  This picture was about the end of William's "help."  Dad and I diligently finished the rest of the pumpkin carving...

but William got re-energized once we were finished and got to put candles in them.

We had to peel him away from the pumpkins for bath time, but he was comforted knowing the pumpkins were going to live on our porch for a while.  Needless to say, he asked where they were first thing this morning and is on his way outside in his pajamas and rain boots in 47 degree weather to check on them as I write this...guess I better go put a coat on him so he doesn't freeze.