Progress Report on B's Room

The room is coming along so quickly, it seems almost unreal! After our 17-month construction project on the house four years ago, we're not used to things going this smoothly, and I had braced myself for things to drag out. But Kevin has done an amazing job of coordinating all the pieces, figuring things out and playing evening and weekend warrior getting the job done. We've also been blessed with some good friends (and Kevin's dad) helping us out with lots of the pieces of the project. Drywall is done, HVAC is almost done, and Brody's room is really taking shape. It's fun to stand in the room and visualize the completed project. Of course I'm already obsessing about his bunk bed and quilts and decorating... but that's just me. :-)

Saturday Morning Pancakes!!

When it's not hunting season, our Saturday morning tradition is PANCAKES by Daddy! The kids get so excited, especially when Daddy plays waiter and takes their order (Sky even tipped him with a dollar bill she had this weekend). This weekend's menu featured Mickey Mouse pancakes... note Brody's rain boots which he wore all morning.

Birthday Boy

February continues with Kevin's birthday on the 19th. The kids are getting the birthday thing down, with presents and blowing out candles and the whole drill! We had a really busy day with other stuff, but we managed to start off the day with presents and a birthday breakfast, meet Daddy for lunch at his office, and then celebrate with ice cream cake with our small group! Not quite a princess party, but it was still special.

Saturday was Grampa's birthday, so we did a little family dinner/party with Gramma & Grampa, Chesty & Conlin and us to celebrate Kevin & Grampa's birthdays. Brody blew out the candles (and almost lit his mouth on fire!) before anyone else had the chance...

A Princess Birthday - One Week Later

I'm finally getting around to posting from Skyla's actual 4th birthday, which was last Saturday, more than a week ago! It's been a crazy week with family visiting and playing catch-up... but now I am taking time to LOOK at the pictures from her birthday and party and am so happy we did a party for her litle princess friends. They're so cute and made her first themed "friends" party so much fun for her. It's amazing how magical a few decorations from Party City and a princess dress can be for a 4-year old! :-) We had Grammy (my mom), Aunt Susan & Uncle Ryan, Aunt Erin, Gramma & Grampa, Uncle Chesty & Conlin, and six of her little friends with their families - and we kept things simple with pizza & cake. But it was so special for her and so much fun to watch the little girls together. Here are a bunch of pictures to give a snapshot of her whole day:

The "big" birthday gift from the whole family - her dollhouse, which she has since spent hours playing with every day, incorporating her princess dolls and other toys into the mix. Her room is like a fairy tale of make-believe!

The doll princess Chatham, the bride princess Elena, and the "Belle" princess Skyla

The three cousins - Brody, Skyla & Conlin.

The princess table - Elena, Skyla & Ella

All the little princesses: Ava, Elena, Skyla, Ella, Olivia, Addie and Callie

The cake - the one thing at the party that was NOT a princess theme!

No party would be complete without ring around the rosie

Lots of presents!

Takes a lot of concentration!

Brody wanted in on the action

Happy Birthday to you!

Brody was so helpful with the birthday candles! He has been practicing...

Daddy and his little girl

Brody playing "pin the princess on the castle" with the girls

We can't believe she is four years old already. Wow!

Belle gives Grampa a hug

This is how Brody spent most of the weekend - curled up on the couch reading books with his "Sammy"

Can It Be -- Four Years?

I can't even believe it's been four years since the arrival of Skyla Rose changed our lives completely. Thinking of her turning four has brought back for me a lot of the emotions and memories of that time in our lives! Wow. We were in the midst of construction on our addition when we decided that surely if we started trying to get pregnant in the spring, by the time the baby arrived nine months later the house would be done and we would be ready. We had visions of decorating the nursery together and doing all kinds of things to get ready for the baby... We spent Memorial Day weekend that year with my grampa and uncle, doing the World War 2 Memorial dedication stuff, and then on Memorial Day, after they left to go home, we took a pregnancy test and found out the amazing news. We were both so excited and a little overwhelmed! Over the next nine months Kevin plugged away on coordinating all the details of the house, we got our dog Josey, and we looked ahead anxiously to February 6th. As the date got closer we started to realize that the house was not going to be completely done by the time the baby came. So the focus started to be getting the house in shape to be able to move in and have the baby! Kevin worked night & day, before & after work to get things done, and with the help of our families and friends we moved in to the addition just a couple of weeks before my due date, but still with a ton of finish work to do. Super Bowl Sunday, Feb 6 came and I was starting to feel like this baby was never going to come, sitting in the living room with my mom just waiting while Kevin raced against the clock to finih one project after another. That Sunday he did the last BIG project of laying the wood floors in our new family room, coming to bed at 2am... and I woke him up at 5:00 ready to go have the baby. In our hospital pictures after Sky was born, Kevin looks more tired than I do!

At the hospital, we were met by our friend Lucille, who was able to be our dedicated labor & delivery nurse. She was amazing and once I got my epidural we had a quiet day of anticipation waiting for the baby. We didn't know what we were having, but we were convinced it was a boy! My mom and Kevin's parents waited outside in the family lobby for news (my dad was arriving that night on an already-planned business trip). And at 4:08 pm we heard the words "It's a girl!" and our lives have never been the same - truly.

I have so many special memories of those first days and weeks with our first baby girl. Driving home from the hospital wondering how we were allowed to leave by ourselves with this baby... seeing our families hold her for the first times... watching my dad whisper quiet love to her... never regretting for one single second that I stopped working to be at home... snuggling in bed just the three of us... going for walks with my baby girl in the spring.

And now she's four... How did that happen? But every year and every stage of her life has been both a blessing and an adventure. She has started to blossom into a sweet little girl and I am daily struck by the responsibility we have to help mold her into the woman God wants her to become. Wow!

I'll post pictures of her little princess birthday party later today - have to weed through about 100 pictures first! :-)

Here We Go Steelers...

Did I just type that? Since the Patriots didn't make it this year, I find myself rooting for my second-favorite AFC team, especially because they are Kevin's home team. This year Kevin hung his dad's big Steelers flag out in front of our house and we have the kids all decked out in their Steelers jerseys (that's where I draw the line - no black & gold jersey for me!)... they are running around singing "Here we go Steelers, here we go..." and Brody has been learning how to evade and tackle with Daddy. Should be a fun night of football!