Silly Girl

Belle's favorite new pastime is to have me take her picture with my laptop. Silly girl.

Dedication

We dedicated both kids at church on Fathers Day. Belle was the oldest one up there. When she was born we had just moved and didn't have a church. So when it came time to dedicate Ethan, we thought it was important that we did them both.

I had worried that Belle would say something embarrassing while we were up there. She's not shy and well you just never know whats going to come out of there mouth. Like Saturday she was telling my parents that "I have spanking. Not listening. Mommy said so." Translated means " Mommy says I get spankings when I don't listen." It was hilarious, you had to be there.



Ok, I got way off topic. Belle was actually pretty good, just antsy, like usual. Ethan was good if you don't count his constant jabber while everyone else was getting prayed over. I was afraid he'd grab the mike right off Pastor Scott's face. Instead Ethan went after his nose while he prayed over him. Wait, uh, I mean I didn't see that. I kept my eyes closed the whole time. =) I did wonder if people were out in the audience thinking we were weird when the pastor asked "what name do you give this child?" and I said "Ethan Amadeus". That middle name is pretty different, but I love it.



Belle went right to the pastor too, no hesitation. Which is not unlike her either. And she didn't say one word when while the pastor was praying either. She was right by his mike so if she had, all would have heard.

Silly Safari

The church had a Dock Party to wrap up the week of the Crocodile Dock VBS. They had a cookout as well as games for the kids to play. They also had a show called Silly Safari. It was a goofy guy showing the kids all kinds of animals. It was pretty entertaining. He had a baby fox, a baby alligator, a bunny, snake, bullfrog, and a crow that swooped over everyone's heads. Belle was very much into it at the beginning, calling out the names of the animals. About halfway through though she joined me and Ethan in the back and rolled around on the floor.

Touching a snake


Bouncing some of her energy out.


And I had a moment of impaired judgement.

VBS fun and a funny Belle quote

Belle just ended a week of Vacation Bible School. I think she had a lot of fun. She walked in on Monday and thought it was a birthday party, maybe with all the decorations. She had one incident where she had to use her back up pants, but was good in that regard the rest of the week.

As you can see, getting a picture today was not going that well. Her tshirt was so huge that I rigged it with a safety pin and a bow. Just in case you were wondering why she had a bow on her shoulder.

As soon as we came home from VBS, Belle made her way to the bathroom. You know what she's doing when she turns on the fan and shuts the door. Well I was making Ethan a bottle when Belle ran out of the hallway with her pants around her ankles. She was saying "Mommy, Mommy, color poopy!! I have special poopy!!" Crazy girl.




In other news, Ethan is mobile. He's semi crawling. Its more of dragging that he's doing. He'll use his arms to pull himself forward, but not really an army crawl either. He's starting to try to pull up as well.

I keep telling myself that I need to get him on video so I'll try to get a video up in the near future.

Honey Do List - Part Two

Here is some more of Nic's handy work. The porch is finished and we just installed a fan and porch swing. I love my new porch swing. My in-laws were so kind to get it for us. Like Nic said "it feels like home now".

You'll notice a few of Belle's birthday presents. She got a new play house from Mamaw and Papaw and she got an outside table and chair set from Mimi and Poppy.

Honey Do List

Poor Nic has been bombarded with a long Honey-Do list.

Build a porch - check
Install fan and swing on porch - check (pictures to come)
Build kids a swingset - check

The kids have been enjoying their new swingset. Nic decided to freestyle and just build one from a picture. We saved quite a bit of money doing it that way. I'm glad I have a handy husband.

The festivities

Its become a tradition to go to the Strawberry Festival parade for Belle's birthday. Its a good parade considering we'd have to go downtown for a decent one around here. The fair parade here in town is just a bunch of tractors in a row.

She just couldn't contain her excitement.



She even got the pageant wave down.



Ethan loved the music. He was such a good boy the whole time.



Then the parade was over and the kids rode home with their candy and loot.


My Grandma sent this cute apron for Belle's birthday. We used it last Friday when we made some funky technicolor cupcakes.

Birthday Girl

Can you believe Belle is 3? Its hard to wrap my head around. There just isn't anything baby about her anymore. She's turning into a little lady.

Birth (what a crappy picture of me, but it was already in my photobucket)


1 year old


2 years old


3 years old

Handmade Goodies

I just thought I'd show off some of the handmade goodies I've acquired recently.

First off is this super cute pillowcase dress that my sister made. She wore it to church this morning and got tons of comments on it. And as you can see, Belle's hair is much shorter. Had I thought of it earlier, I would've taken a picture before church when her hair was done and before she tore the bows out.


And check out this purse. Isn't it the cutest? My friend Ariel made it for me. Check out her great blog and etsy shop. Notice the awesome design of her blog and etsy shop logo. Man, whoever did that is super talented. **wink** =)


Ariel also made me this cute camera strap. It's hard taking a picture of a camera strap while it's on your camera.


Believe it or not, Ariel is also making me a little quilt for Ethan. I had a ton of fun designing stuff for Ariel and love all the handmade goodies.

Tooffies

It's been awhile since Ethan has had a post all his own. The little man is almost 8 mos old. He's been mastering the sippy cup, picking up food (and making it into his mouth), and as of a couple weeks ago he got his first tooth. He beat Belle in that dept, she was over 8 mos before she got any sign of a tooth.

I can't decide if he's trying to crawl or not. If he sees something he wants he'll roll back and forth and then realize that he's only going side to side and not forward. At that point he'll reach and reach for what ever he's after. Throw in a couple leg kicks and he eventually gets it. Belle was already crawling at this point, but I'm not pushing for full mobility yet. My house is no where near ready. Besides Ethan just discovered that he can make farting noises on my arm and I imagine that is much more important to a boy than crawling.

Have you ever tried to get a picture of a 8 mos old's tooth. It's hard, although Ethan was more than willing to chew on my finger.




Can you see it? Look real hard.

Summer Fun

We've had some fun in this wonderful weather.

I broke out the kiddie pool and the kids had a blast.




This is what she did when she started getting cold. She'd go lay on the warm deck.


Dang is this kid cute or what.


Belle has gotten good about riding her tricycle. We took a couple trips around the cul-de-sac this morning.

And saw this little guy


Belle has been sharing with her brother. The picture quality was pretty bad unfortunately.


Belle even got to fly a kite last weekend.

I dare you

I dare you to not laugh out loud at these pics. Or at the very least, crack a smile.

Giraffes & Elephants...But No Mermaids

We had a blast this afternoon at the zoo. We met up with friends Jamie and Ariel and their kiddos Olivia and Titus. It's probably been over a year since Belle's been to the zoo. She was really excited. And she got over the fact that there were no mermaids at the zoo. =)

Belle started out with her "leash" on, but it didn't last long. All in all she did ok. You just can't take your eye off her for a second, because the girl has no fear. I tried to atleast keep her in the stroller between exhibits.


The "leash" came in handy later though when Titus gave it a try. It lasted about as long on him as it did on Belle.

I'm proud of Belle. She did a lot of things she would never do before. She touched the goats and fed the giraffe.




Ethan was golden. I didn't hear boo out of him the whole time. I thought for sure he'd fall asleep, but he didn't. I think he was just taking it all in. He was such a good boy. Jamie freed him from the stroller and I imagine he was glad to stretch his legs for a bit.





And I was reminded again how hard it is to get little ones to sit for a picture.