Cuteness!!!

Emma Claire fell asleep while sitting on the couch today---have you ever seen anything CUTER?? After taking the obligatory pictures of her sleeping while sitting up, I laid her down and made her more comfortable, where she proceeded to take a 45 minute nap. I just can't get enough of her!! :)

Busy, busy!!!

Sorry I've been slacking at keeping up the blog lately! It's been busy around here--what else is new? Here are a few recent pictures of my little monkeys!! 

HILARIOUS!!!!

If you have some time to waste and want to laugh like crazy, go check out Cakewrecks. It's a blog dedicated to cakes gone wrong, and I promise you'll love it. Click HERE to see my favorite post--I laughed so hard I cried. Be sure to read the commentary. :)

Can you tell that Ben's working late, the children are in bed, and nothing is on tv? I'm bored but very glad my friend, Jenni,  recommended this blog! 

Clemson game

me, Rebecca, and Deven

The boys: Will, Josh, Derek, Roby, Dave, Brad, and Ben

The girls: Dev, me, Allison, Laura, Christie, Bec, and Robin

everybody!

We went to the Clemson/Duke game last Saturday (31-7---go Tigers!!!) and had our annual reunion with the Alpha Chi girls and their hubbies/boyfriends. It was SO great to see everybody again!! We don't get to see each other nearly enough since we're spread out between South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia, and we have children and jobs that keep us busy, but whenever we all manage to get together it's like we're in college all over again. Here are a few pics from our fabulous time together! I love you girls!! :)

Help wounded soldiers and their families...

...by voting for this amazing woman! Lina Czbuas is a long-time volunteer at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and is good friends with some good friends of ours, Bob and Linda Freeman. At 84 years old, she volunteers five days a week at Walter Reed through the American Red Cross--you can read more about her on the voting link, and I promise you will be impressed. 

Lina is a national finalist in the L'Oreal Women of Worth competition. If she wins, her favorite charity--the Fisher House at Walter Reed wins $25,000! Please help make a difference in wounded soldiers' lives and vote for Lina. Just click HERE and cast your vote--it only takes a few seconds. Voting ends November 24th. Thanks so much for helping this wonderful cause! :)

Cowboy party

We went to Emma Claire's friend James' first birthday party on Saturday, and both Grayson and Emma Claire got to experience their first pony ride (if you can call EC's a "ride"---really just sitting unhappily on the pony's back while mommy snapped a few pictures). James' mommy, Lillian, did an awesome job with the party---it was cowboy-themed, and there were all kinds of cute touches like cowboy hats for all of the children, bales of hay scattered around the yard, and even a little baby pool filled with dried corn for the children to play in. The kiddos (and the adults!) had a blast. Happy birthday, James! We had a great time! :)

Tip Junkie

Hey, all you bloggers, head over to Tip Junkie for the awesome Mom-preneur Shop-a-thon Giveaway! You don't want to miss this!

Wordless Wednesday

Say what?

Grayson, this afternoon, pretending to talk on the phone to his daddy:

Hello, Daddy! Yeah, I'm just playing with my toys. 

(big huff of breath)

Hold on, Emma Claire's whining. Emma Claire, you stop that screaming right now!

(another big huff of breath)

Okay, I'm back. She's just whining. Okay, talk to you later! Love you! Bye bye! 

Out of the mouths of babes!!! :)

Tapping my inner creative side...

I am far from creative---I'd love to be and I'm envious of those who are, but I'm just not. I've heard a lot about Scrapblog lately and have messed around with it a little but never had much success. Tonight I decided that I would try to design a Christmas card...and check out what I did! It's not great by any means, but it's not half bad! I'm think I'm going to play around some more and hopefully save some money this year by designing our Christmas cards instead of ordering them like I usually do. The Halloween picture is just for demonstration purposes only--I had some professional pictures done last week that I'm hoping will turn out cute enough to use for our Christmas card. What do you think? :)

Haven't done this in awhile...

Since I'm using this blog as a sort of baby book for the children, I try to occasionally post things that they're doing, accomplishments, and current likes/dislikes. Here's the latest on my two little monkeys....

Grayson...

1. Is 3 years and 2 months old.

2. Wears "big boy underwear" during the day and pull-ups during naps and nighttime. He is doing very well with potty training and doesn't have accidents very often anymore. Yay, Grayson!

3. Gave up his pacifier a month and a half ago! I keep forgetting to post this great news! We were so worried that we'd waited too long to take it away but we just put it away one day and told him that he was a big boy and didn't need it anymore, and that was the end of it!

4. Still sleeps with Bubba, his bunny blanket. He discovered a few months ago that we actually have two Bubbas (I would exchange one for the other when it needed to be washed) and now insists sleeping with both.

5. Has been OBSESSED with all of the cars from the movie Cars for over a year. He has a different favorite every day and has to take them everywhere we go and sleep with them.

6. Loves french fries. They are a great bargaining tool! :)

7. Makes up silly words all the time to make us laugh. His latest is "taggerbooster"---he calls us taggerboosters and then cracks up at himself.

8. Can count to ten in Spanish. I had no idea he could do this until his parent/teacher conference a couple of weeks ago! Very cute!

9. Is getting ready to move from the toddler class (18 months to 3 year olds) to the primary class (3-6 year olds) at his Montessori school. He'll also start going five mornings a week instead of three. I observed in his new class this week and was amazed at how well three, four, and five year olds can work together, and the mentoring relationships between the older and younger children. We can't wait to see how Grayson does in his new class!

10. Has finally grasped the concept of counting, rather than just reciting numbers---he can count objects up to 6 now.

Emma Claire...

1. Is 16 months old.

2. Runs everywhere she goes and can climb just about everything---it's not unusual to find her sitting on the kitchen table.

3. Still has no interest in girly-toys like baby dolls. Grayson's cars and trucks are much more fun!

4. Cuddles more than any child I know! In fact, she's laying in my lap as I'm typing this---she loves to be held, hugged, and kissed. Can you believe it's one of my favorite things about her? :)

5. Can say: no, mine, down, snack, nana (banana), ma, da, bath, ball, door, sock, and shoe.

6. Knows animal sounds for: cat, dog, cow, duck, and sheep. 

7. Can identify her hair, mouth, teeth, tongue, hand, foot, and eye. Still working on nose and ear! :) 

8. "Talks to" animals--it's the funniest thing, whenever she sees a dog or a cat she immediately starts doing this high-pitched squealing babble that we know as her "animal talk". She chases our cat around the house "talking" to him, and even though she's terrified of dogs she loves watching them (from mommy or daddy's arms) and squealing at them. 

9. Sleeps with her pink bunny blanket (the pink version of Grayson's Bubba). We're still waiting for her to name it---for now it's "ba". 

10. Is in the 25th percentile for weight and height, but has the biggest tummy--she constantly gets comments on how huge her tummy is compared to her small size. The girl can put down some food! :)

DuBose pictures!

This one of Grayson cracks me up---it's terrible but it's SO Grayson!!! He makes the funniest faces and I think it's hilarious that the photographer caught this one!! :)

There is an amazing photographer who comes from Charleston once a year to do these gorgeous old-fashioned pictures of children, and I was so excited to have Emma Claire's finally done. We had Grayson's done when he was a little over a year old so I've wanted to have EC's taken so I can put them in a frame together. They are uber-expensive (we're talking $165 for two 4x5 prints!!) but I think they're worth it since it's not something we have done very often. I had Grayson's taken this year, too, but I don't love any of them so I probably won't order any of him. Here are a few of my favorites...