we miss you grandpa

Happy 4th Birthday Eloise

  Really, is she already 4? only 4? It's weird how time passes. Here, I think she looks like a teenager. Her Daddy made her birthday pancakes to start the many many sugar highs that we had for the day.

Eloise had a great birthday gift of having "la la Grandpa" come visit for a long weekend. The girls call Alan's parents, "la la GraMoM and la la Grandpa" because of a song that Lisa made up to the tune of Fur Elise that starts "la la la la la la El-o-ise, oh El-o-ise, oh El-o-ise"

I think GraMoM tried to fight it, but now she embraces it and even signed a card that way!

 After breakfast we opened presents with GraMoM (via skype) and Grandpa. She loves her new bus and coloring book from London!

To celebrate the big event we met up with my family for our monthly concert in the park/picnic. The venue has a big open lawn and stage as well as 2 playgrounds and a sprayground. So much fun for all of us. We celebrated my niece, Madeline's, birthday too. She will become an official teenager later this month!

 Again, the girls are all dressed in coordinating, handmade dresses that Dawn made. So cute!

Yum!!

We love you so much, Eloise! 

We are captivated everyday by your beauty, love (for your sisters, God, puzzles and at the moment fancy horses), and your laughter. You are a blessing from God and our cup runneth over! 

Love, Mommy and Daddy

Happy Birthday Grandma!

 Most of our pictures lately are at family gatherings because my brother, Brian, takes great pictures and then uploads them. So, thanks Brian and Dawn! My mom, Dawn and my mom's best friend, Amanda and I spent the day strolling around historic Roswell shopping and eating for my mom's birthday. We met up with rest of the gang for dinner.....a great time was had by all-except Jeff who was working =(.

digging in to the queso dip

 beautiful ladies....

and happy early birthday to this beautiful TEENAGER!!!!

Staycation!

Alan took the first two weeks of July off from work and we had a blast hanging out, discovering more of Atlanta, a long weekend away at the lake with friends and lots o' ice cream!

 We went to see Madagascar 3....Fancy Nancy style. We parents earn big points for this one!

 5 months (she's 6 months now-this posting is just a month late)

Our new and fabulous playhouse. Thanks to a ton of hard work from Alan, my dad and brother, Jeff, to level the ground and build it! This girls love it and can't wait to play out there more once it isn't so dang hot outside!

You can never be too safe....wearing her life jacket the night before we went to a lake house in North Ga with two other families. We had such a wonderful time! Our kids swam in a lake and rode a boat for the first time. Below is Eloise and Margot's best friend, Kira and her little brother, John and another friend, Alice. Laurel missed the photo-op while napping, too bad.

 Happy 4th of July...Alan and I ran (participated) in the Peachtree Road Race on the morning of the 4th. It was fun but somewhat painful as we really only ran once the week before the 10k race. We vowed to actually train next year!

  early morning dig in the yard

We've started attempting to feed Laurel, she totally loves it, but not sure if any of the rice cereal has actually been swallowed yet. We are enjoying her so much....she's a fun, easy baby that brings so much joy to our day.

 Jam-session 

On the way home from more ice cream, too silly to walk anymore

"Hey Margot, give me a smile....say cheese!"

Our sweet, hilarious 'lil fro fro'. Margot is officially a big girl now in so many ways...potty trained, sleeping in a big girl bed and weaning from the pacifier. She's also talking up a storm, completely infatuated with her little sister and bikes and growing a serious afro by the day! We love her curlies (as Eloise calls them), but she often won't allow us to tame them, thus she has earned the nick name, 'lil fro fro.'

Oh, a few other tidbits...she consistently wears her shoes on the wrong feet and her sunglasses upside down and is in that funny stage of learning to smile on cue.

 Here's the smile! We now call it the pirate face and it has spurred lots of piratey playtime

 However, these pirates also clean because having bandannas on their heads is like Cinderella. 

It's very confusing.

 The photoshot of her new big girl bed. Notice the already decorated mural on the wall to the left. Again we cannot seem to harness her creative expressions.

No smile here, just so sinkin' cute!