Thanksgiving '09

**For some reason it's not letting me move my pics so it's just going to have to stay here (and out of order)**

Decorating for Christmas!

All ready for the UF vs FSU game!

My Uncle snuck Sophie some chocolate for during breakfast! AND she has discovered her nose lately, ha!

Playing with Cade who is my cousin Tanner's boy. He was SO good with Sophie!

Sophie is ALWAYS playing with her tongue some how! Glad I finally got it on camera!

Sophie terriorized this poor dog!! She LOVES animals and goes crazy anytime she sees one!! He was pretty patient with her until the end and we had to keep her away from him! Bless his heart!

This Thanksgiving was perfect!! I LOVE LOVE LOVE the holidays and was so excited to share it with Sophie this year that I couldn't even sleep Wednesday night, ha!! We got up Thursday morning and headed to Homosassa Springs to my Aunt Renee's (FYI - my middle name comes from her) house. On the way to my Aunt's we stopped and visited with my dad for a bit. He had a funeral to do the next day so he was in town. We arrived at my aunt's just in time to eat, ha! I meant to get there early to help cook, but traffic wasn't very good so the trip there took a lot longer than expected. There was a house full of family waiting some what patiently for us to arrive so that we could eat :)! It was such a wonderful feeling to be surrounded by family!

Basically, all we did this weekend was talk, fish - I don't fish, I just hang out with the others, watch football, and eat until we were stuffed! It was so much fun!

I did something that I said I would never do...I went shopping on Black Friday! It wasn't just shopping it was going to Toys R Us at 12am and standing outside in the freezing cold for two hrs! What us mothers do for our babies, ha! It was actually a lot of fun! I hate to admit it, but I had to REALLY refrain from being "one of those shoppers"! You know the kind that push people out of the way with my buggy, tackle another for the toy they have, and make little kids cry because their lil' legs can't carry them out of my way fast enough! I did end up getting some great toys for Sophie at half price! I am having a HARD time not giving them to her, ha! I've always been the type to tell what I get people just because I get so excited I can't keep it in, ha! I don't know what I'm going to do when Sophie is older! She's going to have to convince ME to wait!

Brag much :)

So this post is going to be that of a proud momma and all about the cute stuff Sophie has done lately! No one will probably be very interested except for me and my family so feel free skip ahead :)! Each day Sophie discovers something new! She is the most amazing little thing to watch! Since there is so many worth mentioning that she has done I'm going to bullet point them, ha!

-She has started cuddling with her babydolls/stuffed animals! She'll even pat their backs like I do her!
-When Sophie is laying on the ground I will start blowing on her tummy and kissing her all over so now she is laying her dolls/stuffed animals on the ground and doing the same thing I do to her
-She is saying "Kitty" when she sees a cat and will cuddle her baby while saying "Baby", I think that she has said "Dog" but it's not as pronounced as the others. And she is FINALLY saying "MaMa" along with "Nan Nan" which is what she calls my momma and what she said BEFORE "MaMa" (One thing is FOR SURE - she is her Nan's girl!!)
-she claps her hands to the music - and stays on rhythm - which is something that I can't even do, ha!
-She is climbing the stairs - which is a bit problematic! The other day I ran upstairs for literally two seconds and when I came back down she was already on the fourth step. Let's just say the gate is going up this weekend!
-The other day I was blow drying my hair with my round brush and put the brush down. I looked back over at Sophie and she was brushing her hair
-Yesterday she tried putting my shoe on Joe, but he had his shoes on so she untied them and tried to get them off to put mine on him!
-THEN she tried putting her own shoe on her foot!
-She LOVES to entertain us! I think she is going to be funny like Joe's Aunt Teresa and Grandma! Which I am so happy about!! I've always wished I was naturally funny like them so I hope she does take after them!
-She has been SO loving lately! Yesterday she actually gave me a hug! It was the most special moment! She did it a lot that morning! And she would grab my face and smile at me. LOVED LOVED LOVED it!
-She still doesn't have any teeth, ha! However she is eating table food - she's quite the 'gummer'!
-I was holding a container of Sweet Potatoe Puffs and Sophie would stop by occasionally during her play to grab a few puffs. Well, she picked up the lid that was laying next to me and put the lid back on...maybe it's nothing, but I was very impressed!

Places to go and Things to see

Sophie has been on the move, folks!! She LOVES to stand up so she'll go from one object to another and pull herself up - ALL DAY LONG. I would say that she'll be walking with in the next month, but I know as soon as I say it she'll make a liar out of me! Sophie does things on her time and not a minute sooner - or later for that matter! I am beginning to see how her birth is going to be the story of her life! I was in labor for 16 hrs (14 hrs of hard labor). From 8:30pm-11:30am I was stuck at 3cm. At 1pm I was fully dilated. She was ready. After the nurses kept me from pushing for TWENTY minutes so the doctor could get there, the dr walked in and 15 mins later she was out. I was ready to have her here!! The last part is to show where she gets her stubbornness from, ha! My mom said that she looked down and saw that look on my face - which she knew well from my teenage years - and KNEW I was getting that baby out NOW! I can be stubborn about doing something when I'm ready. (My stubbornness is REALLY something I have to constantly work on!) For example, in high school a bunch of us went cliff jumping - ok, there aren't any cliffs in FL...it was some kind of REALLY deep sink whole. Safe I know! It took them about 15 mins to convince me to jump and only then would I do it if my bf would do it too. Well, he started counting and was at "2" and I jumped! I was ok, but almost threw him over. I was ready to go THEN and if I waited I knew I wouldn't do it. All of that to say, "What goes around, comes around!"

There is nothing really too exciting going on in our lives! Everything is pretty quiet and we welcome it after the EVENTFUL past two and half years! I think that I have had every "life stressor" during that time and I'm pretty sure God knew that I needed to have things settled for a bit. My personality craves change and something to do so it's been a learning experience to just be still! However, Joe graduates in May and we might be having some changes again! I'll keep you updated! And no I'm not pregnant :)!

Dancing Queen

I FINALLY got it on video...Sophie dancing!! This child is always getting into the groove of the music! Last night while we were out to dinner Sophie would start dancing every time a new song would come on!! After missing the action the first couple of times I was on stand by to catch it! It took me a couple times to get her really going to town so that is why the video is broken up!

A little rushed

Well, there isn't very much going on, but I feel the need to update. Actually there is a lot going on in our life, but it is the boring, mundane stuff that I'm sure no one really cares about. I have my Mary Kay debut party next Tuesday, the 13 at 6:30. I'm very excited about it, but also a little overwhelmed! I get in late Saturday night from Kentucky and leave early Wednesday morning for California. So I have to organize a party, unpack, do laundry, pack, go through my inventory for MK, clean my house, set up for my party, and spend some time with my husband - all of this with in 3 days. Yikes. Although now that it is written down it doesn't seem like such a load. I got this covered :). I know this is a lot of traveling and I'm sure some mothers are gasping at me for keeping my child so "out of schedule". I have actually worried about the same thing. I have watched Sophie closely to see if she acts unsettled or to be bothered by our frequent trips. She seems to be great and goes with the flow.



So it's actually Thursday and I am in California! YAY! Oh, but what a HORRIFIC trip out here it was. Maybe one day I'll tell it, but right now it just makes me too exhausted to even try to explain it! I have decided that this will be Sophie's last trip! It's getting too rough for both of us! She is at that age where she wants to play not be couped up with Mommy on a seat! Ha, one story from our trip...I could tell Sophie was just restless because she wanted space to play. So I put her on the seat and scooted forward. Well, apparently I didn't give her enough room because she kept pushing me until I moved out of her way. What a little princess she is!

It is wonderful to be here with my sister! Besides Joe she is the closest person to me. With us being so close it makes me sad that we are so far apart! Especially now that we have babies! Oh my word, Sophie ADORES Emma just like I adored my sister! She seriously follows Emma EVERY WHERE!! Bless Emma's heart, Sophie literally had her corned one time! When Emma does something Sophie's eyes just light up! It is precious!

Emma had a her first major boo boo! While we were at the park she tripped on the play set and busted her chin open. She was such a trooper though - she just kept on going. Sissy actually had to chase her down to try and stop the bleeding. I must say that my sister was a trooper as well. She remained very calm and didn't seem the least bit freaked out that her daughter's chin was literally dripping blood. I, on the other hand, don't do so well with blood! It makes me very queasy! It makes me nervous that when my own children have accidents that I won't be able to handle it. Give me throw up, poop shooting across the room all over me, and I'm fine, but if I see blood I'm done! Hopefully it'll be different with my own.

Fun, Fun, and more Fun!!

We had one of the best weekends we've had in a very long time!!! It was a much needed break! Here's a break down of the trip...

-Friday night we went to Jacksonville for a birthday party of a child hood friend's son. It was so great to spend time with him and his family!! It's wild that we all have kids now. James and Jaimie have 4 and let me tell you I have a whole new respect for the two of them! Their kids were well behaved, well dressed, and beyond adorable! (Do you notice that I always have to have three points? It must be my Church of God upbringing, ha!)

-Saturday the three of us hung out at the pool and relaxed all day! It was wonderful to have Joe all to ourselves! We also went to our fav restaurant NY Pizza! It was fabulous as always!

-Sunday was more relaxing and being together. Then we headed out that night to pick up Erica and Chris!

-Monday Joe and Chris went golfing while Erica and I sat around talking (and eating, ha!). That night we went to Bubba Gumps - which was out of this world!

-Tuesday was more golfing for the boys and more hanging out for Erica and I. We were going to head to St Augustine for some shopping, but since I miscalculated the distance we didn't go. I was afraid that we wouldn't make it back in time to leave because Joe had class. We did have time since the boys didn't get back until close to 4:30. Joe ended up skipping class which was a fun choice! As we were heading home we stopped at NY Pizza to share the 'wonderfulness' with Chris and Erica! They seemed to enjoy it very much!

That was our weekend summed up! We had such a great time with those two!! It felt like the four of us have been friends our entire life! We are so thankful that they came down to see us!! Hopefully there will be many more trips together!

Here are some pictures from the trip!

This was the most AMAZING chocolate pie EVER!!!

What Erica and I did most of the time, haha!

Hooray!

Joe found out today that he got a job as a personal banker for Florida Bank!! YAY!!! I'm so proud of him as it was a job that was highly sought after! The job is in downtown Tampa so it's a little bit farther of a drive, but totally worth it! This is such an answer to prayer! Plus, I think it's the perfect job for him! I was going to throw him a little party tonight, but it just didn't work out :(. My mom was also planning a celebration party for him while we were in Kentucky - which is a post I will do soon :) - but we hadn't found out that he had gotten it yet.

We leave tomorrow for Daytona with some friends, Chris and Erica! I am so excited about this trip and have been looking forward to it!! Erica and I know each other from Lee and have kept in touch since college. We actually weren't that close in college, but I always wanted to be her friend because I thought she was cool :). And she is!