"Can you tell me how to get....

how to get to Bennett Street."

 Time for Bennett's 2nd Birthday Party!  Yay...I worked on this one for a while and had so much fun planning it!  Bennett loves Sesame Street, so it was an easy choice for his 2nd birthday. I once again took so many pictures, and I wish I could share them all...but instead here are about 40 of my favorites!

We had his party a week early, and all of our wonderful family and friends braved the warmest day of 2011 to celebrate with us.  When I say it was hot...it was HOT!

Any party wouldn't be complete with a special outfit made by Mimi (and Papa too)!

 Each kid had a personalized bucket filled with coloring goodies, stampers, notebooks, bubbles, picture frame and more.  These buckets were awesome and I found them in the $1 bin at Target.  With a little vinyl they ended up perfect.

 The parents so loved us!  Each kiddo took home "Elmo's" goldfish...complete with fish food.

                                     
                                     

Oscar had his own Tattoo Parlor...

 Sweet Hana helped all the younger kids put on their tattoos.

Each kid got a trash can goody from Oscar himself!

And their own trash can cup!

                                     

Cookie Monster had his own cookie toss! Lincoln and Cora were pros!

                                     

 Daddy built a bingo wheel for Sesame Street bingo. 

 BB and Coralyne concentrating...

 We had popcorn cones, gumball flowers, goldfish and fruit skewers to snack on.

 Sweetest boy ever!  He had so much fun running around playing with all of his sweet friends.

 Birthday cake and cupcakes.  My friend Lacey and I made the cake ourselves!

 "Happy Birthday to you!!!!"

 When we talked about his party all he would say is "cake please."  Well needless to say he enjoyed every bite!

 Two of a kind.  BB loves his Uncle Kiss!

 And...his Aunt Julie

 Big thank you to our families!  They were tons of help and once again I couldn't have done it without them!

                                     

 Baby Landen came too!  Ava is in love with him!

 Soo many presents from our generous family and friends!

Happiest of Happy Birthdays sweet Bennett Parker!  We hope you enjoyed your special day!

Warrior Dash 2011

 Yep...that's me in a tutu!  Never really thought that would happen unless I was playing dress up with Ava, but I was a good sport and wore one for my girls Brandy and Lacey.  With a little peer pressure from Brandy, the three of us signed up for the Warrior Dash in Mountain City.  Basically a 5K consisting of running, climbing, sliding, crawling, swimming, jumping, fire...and praying all while covered in thick mud.  It was tons of fun and worth every minute.

People dress pretty crazy for this event, but we chose Thing 1, Thing 2 & Thing 3.

 Scoping out the competition...as we strategically placed ourselves at the back of our heat.

 Crawling & climbing over wrecked cars came after we waded through/swam in the swampy muddy water.

 Here, we pulled ourselves (by rope) over the wall.  Freaked ME OUT when we got to the top.  It was high and, slippery from mud and you had to very carefully climb down by little slats in the wall.

 Yay!  We did it!  Picture does not do just how dirty we were!

So glad we signed up and can't wait until Warrior 2012!

Our sweet Ava was named the Student of the month for the primary grades at her school for the month of April.  Each month 2 students are picked by the teachers and staff, and Ava was chosen!  We are so proud of our girl!

Strawberry Pickin

We are so lucky we have a great local farm and great friends to do fun things with!  We met our friends the Durdens at Southern Belle Farms for a warm spring strawberry pickin day!

 She LOVES him!!! And he LOVES her too!

 Thinks he is a big boy!

 Yummy! Nothings better than a fresh, juicy red strawberry!

 Bennett would pick strawberries and walk around with them in his hand.  When we got home he has red juice all up and down his arms and legs.

                                                        

 Sweet friends all looking at the camera.  Brandy was doing something funny behind me, and it worked!

 Silly silly boys!

 They might have their brothers beat!

 Lots of farm animals to see, including goats, horses, cows, pigs, and baby chicks!

 Nothings better than a warm spring day spent outside with great friends!



Happy Easter!

I love this time of year, spring has arrived, the weather is warming up and the resurrection gives me the feeling of promise and hope! I love that as our kiddos get older, they understand more and more what this special day is really all about!

Like always, we colored Easter eggs.  Last year, Bennett was still to little but this year he was very intrigued by the whole process.

My pretty girl, is an old pro!

Right before he tossed the cup into the air!

Easter morning arrived very early!  The Easter bunny came and left some goodies for Ava and Bennett. We then got ready and rushed to Buckhead Church for an amazing Easter service.

                                    

 Bennett was tuckered out after Waumba land!

 After church we headed to Aunt Katie and Uncle Adam's for an Easter brunch.

My sweet family!

 My pretty little lady had tons of fun hunting eggs!

 Pop giving BB a hand at finding the eggs.

 Bubbles...nothing sweeter than a baby boy in his jon jon, white knee socks and white shoes!

 Oh...Aunt Katie was 40 weeks on Easter!  She was sooo ready for sweet Landen to arrive!

 Chocolate and BB...don't mix!

 Ava and her cousin sweet Kinsley!  Ava thinks she is "so cute"!

 Brotherly love!  Sweet Ava is such a good sport and such a great big sister!

 

First Haircut

Well, I knew it was coming the day my sweet boy would get his haircut.  What can I say, he was blessed with beautiful hair so why in the world would I want to cut it!  Who cares that on several occasions (3 times in one day) someone said what a pretty little girl. So it was getting to shaggy so we headed to Pigtails and Crewcuts for another first!

He was such a good boy, no tears, no screaming he just sat there still and wondered why mama was about to cry.

 My sweet little man!

 Check out the new "do"!  Such a handsome boy and still some curls in the back to make me smile!

Growing Up...

Yes, they are.  It's a fact of life I know, but trust me when I say that I am fighting it with everything I have.  Don't get me wrong, I and so very thankful and my heart rejoices in the fact that I have two healthy, smart, thriving children.  But forgive me, if I'm having a "hard" time watching them grow up too fast.

Now...to discuss my sweet girl.  You see, this picture below is the VERY last picture of her with ALL of her baby teeth.  We noticed she had a loose tooth about a month ago, but figured we had a little more time. (Or at least I was praying we did).  The morning of the big event, I noticed her gum below her tooth was pretty red so in my gut I knew it wouldn't be long.

 I remember her first tooth, like it was yesterday.  We waited and waited for it's arrival.  She drooled, drooled and drooled some more, and just before her very first birthday that sweet little tooth made it's grand entrance.  No more toothless grin.

Well tonight, not long after Nick came home from work.  Ava comes running in with more excitement than I have ever seen....it happened.  She showed daddy, he touched the tooth, it fell out.  I put on a "brave" face for my sweet girl (because I didn't want to ruin her moment), grabbed my camera and started taking pictures

 Seriously so excited she couldn't stand it and so very proud of this "right" of passage.  Me...I wanted to cry.  Just another part of growing up I guess. First comes kindergarten, next losing teeth.

 Regardless of how I feel, this is such a special moment we will never forget.  She left the tooth fairy her sweet baby tooth along with a 8 sentence note which ended with her asking the tooth fairy to sign her name.  Lucky girl woke up to $5 and Fiona the Fairy's fancy signature.

So thankful for this sweet face and know that more momentous hard moments are on their way...wouldn't change any of it for the world.