Merry Christmas!!!!

Well, as you can tell, I haven't posted in a while and that's because our holiday season has been crazy busy this year!!! We have been busy busy busy around here! So, I don't have much time or energy to type right now but I wanted to wish everyone a Merry Christmas! This pic was the one on our Christmas card this year- I just love it! Annalee looks so sweet! I'll leave you with a few more pics from the past few weeks and hopefully after Christmas I will have some time and energy to write more!!

Here is Annalee with Santa! She loved him!!! And when he asked- she told him exactly what she wanted - " a teapot and dollhouse!"

Here is the whole fam with Santa! By this time- Annalee was tired of the camera!! But how cute is her face???
This is Annalee with her tree in her room! She loved decorating it! and so did I!! So as Annalee has been saying lately- "Merry Christmas through all the year!" I have no idea where she got that!!!

Happy Halloween!

Annalee chose to be Cinderella for Halloween!! And she was so precious! Here in the picture she is holding her Prince Charming doll. We had to get this doll when we got the outfit because-to her- Cinderella doesn't come without her Prince Charming too! Here she is at the Harvest Party at church. She has been talking about this everyday since we went.

Here she is riding the ponies at the Harvest Party. Her horse's name was "Billy Jack." She kept saying "Go Billy Jack Go!!" while she was riding him.

Here is the whole family at the Harvest Party!
Chuck & Annalee after carving our Jack-O-Lanterns! She loved lighting these every night and blowing them out before bed. Here is Cinderella before we went Trick-or-Treating! She had the best time! At every house she said "Trick-or-Treat" and "Thank You!" What a polite princess! We had a great Halloween weekend! I love my family so much!

"Look at That!"

One of Annalee's new sayings- "Look at that!" Well, there has been a lot to look at lately! Annalee is growing every day and becoming a little girl right before our eyes! We watched a show the other day where the little boy wondered why his grandma wore glasses. Annalee kept saying that she wanted to wear glasses too. So, the next day when we were at Target guess what was in the $1 aisle??? Glasses!!! We had to get a pair. We popped the lenses out and "Look at that!" Annalee has her own pair of glasses! She loves them!

Look at who's in the box? Annalee was watching Cinderella the other day and I was putting the dishes away. She got really quiet- which is not like her at all! So, I look over the counter and she is like this, in the box watching the movie! How cute!!! I love her so much! She makes me laugh every day!!! What a big girl!

Day Out with Thomas

Last Saturday we went to ride Thomas the Tank Engine! Chuck, Annalee and I headed out that morning for a day of fun with Thomas. Annalee has started loving Thomas and all his train friends lately! She chuga chugs around the house and knows all their names. She dances when the song comes on and just loves it all! Here we are at our Day Out with Thomas!

Annalee waving to Thomas! She said "Hi Thomas" over and over again while she was waving!

Here we are on the train! All ready to go!

Here is Annalee standing next to a picture of her favorite engine- Emily. She is one of the only girl engines on the show! We had such a fun time and can't wait to have our next "fun" day out together!

Playing in the Kitchen

Annalee loves playing in the kitchen! (especially when I'm cooking!) Here are a few pictures of her playing with the oven mitts. They are in the bottom drawer and I let her play with them whenever she wants. She really thinks she is a BIG girl playing with them!

What a BIG smile! And look at all those teeth!!! Here she is trying to push her stroller with the oven mitts on! It was so cute to watch her try to do this!! She is great!

Things are Busy Around Here

Well, things have been really busy here around our house lately. Annalee is growing everyday. She's finding new things to climb on, new things to play with and just growing up too fast! Here she is riding her Rocking Elephant that Nannie and PawPaw gave her for Christmas. She can get on and off all by herself now and loves it! She thinks she is such a Big Girl! (and she is!) Not only do we have all these new things going on with Annalee, but I'm also getting ready to start Kingdom Kids at Church. (it's like Mother's Day Out) We go on Tuesdays and Thursdays and I teach a 4 year old class while Annalee is going to be in the Toddler class this year. So, we are having meetings and getting things all set up for that! Plus football season has begun and around our house that is a BIG deal!

Here is Annalee climbing on the coffee table. I don't just let her do this, but if I turn my back for long enough she climbs up there and just laughs! We're starting to learn what No means!

And here she is eating a powdered doughnut! See all the powder on her face! Too cute! More to come soon!!

Are You Ready For Some Football?

Annalee and Uncle Luke are ready! Yes, this is my little brother- Luke. But he's not so little anymore! This post is for him. As he is well into 2-a-day practices I want him to know that we love him! He is the BEST brother and Uncle that we could ever ask for! I know sometimes his practices can get rough and tough but he has a HUGE fan club in us no matter what! We love you Uncle Luke! Keep working hard and it will all pay off!

I never thought my little girl would love football as much as she does! Go Uncle Luke Go!

Encores and More North

I'm going to consign some of Annalee's clothes, toys, etc... in the Encores and More North Consignment Sale here in a couple of weeks. I'm very excited because I went to their Spring/Summer sale and they had TONS of great stuff! Not only do they have consignment clothes, but they also have Gymboree/Boutique clothes 60%-80% off! The sale is here in the Rivergate area from August 9-16. I'll leave a link to their website here for anyone who's interested!

http://encoresandmorenorth.com

Summer Fun

Annalee and I are having a blast this summer. We have gotten to do so much more than she could do last summer. There's a big difference between 6 months old and 18 months old. Here she is enjoying her 1st ice cream sandwich. She (of course) loved it!

Doesn't this picture just make you want to go have one right now?

We've also gotten to spend lots of time in the pool at Mama and Pops/Cat and T's house. She loves her water wings and will just take off in them all by herself. She kicks her legs and just floats away. She gets so excited when I tell her we are going swimming! Her favorite thing, though, is getting in and out of the pool. She's in for 10 minutes and out for 5, in for 5 and out for 10. I call her my little "busy bee!"

18 Months Old

Annalee turned 18 months old last week! She has grown up so fast! She's running, jumping, talking and learning everyday. Sometimes the things she says and does just crack me up. She is so smart-it just amazes me! She is so special and we love her so so so much! Here are a few pictures from the last couple of weeks of my little angel!

Happy Fourth of July!

Making her "face!"

A day at the park

Playing at Home

Corn on the Cob and Coloring

It wouldn't be summertime without some corn on the cob! This has become one of Annalee's favorite things to eat lately. I used to just let her have some bites off mine, but one night she said "whole thing" and pointed to my corn on the cob. So, I got brave and let her have the "whole thing" and she loved it! Since then, whenever we have it, Annalee gets her own corn on the cob!

Along with corn on the cob, Annalee's new favorite thing to do is to color! Which is great because I love to color too! We have this great big coloring book her Uncle Jeff and Aunt Amanda got her for her birthday and we lay it out on the floor with all the crayons and color together. Sometimes Chuck gets into it too! We colored him a picture today while he was at work. I can't believe my little girl is coloring already! It is really amazing how much she is growing each day!

All Dressed Up

Annalee has really enjoyed dressing up lately. Here she is all dressed up in her daddy's shorts. She did this all by herself. One night we were cleaning up after dinner and she went into our bedroom and brought Chuck's shorts back out. Next thing we knew she was all dressed up like this! If you look closely she put the drawstring around her neck to keep them from falling off. She was twirling around and around like it was a dress! And she was giggling too- she knew she had done something funny!

Here Annalee is all dressed up for Hawaiian Day! At Davidson-where I work in the summer- we have our annual camp luau. It's on a Friday and we always go over there on Fridays. So, I got her all ready for it. This is here standing by the car all ready for the luau! She loved dressing up- I know the look on her face doesn't show it-but she really did like it! She's holding her princesses-Snow White and Sleeping Beauty. There aren't many places that the princesses don't go with us lately. Well, here is my little girl all dressed up! I wonder what she'll do next!

"I Did It!"

"I did it!" That's what Annalee said on Monday after she pee peed in the potty for the first time! Here is her first picture after she did it! How cute is she? She was and still is so proud of herself! I'm so proud of her too! She really has shown no interest in the potty at all. But on Sunday night she wanted to sit on the big toilet. Well, silly me totally forgot that the potty chair we got came with an attachment to fit on the toilet seat! : ) So, there I was Sunday night holding her up on the potty. Later on that night (the light bulb went off ) and I remembered that we had this attachment and I put it on. Well, on Monday Annalee was very interested in what it was. So, before her nap she wanted to sit on it. I let her and the next thing I knew she was doing it!!! I cheered and cheered for her! Since then, she hasn't done again- but that's okay! She has sat there a few times, but nothing happened. Her favorite thing to do, though, is to wipe! I don't know why, but she loves to tear the paper off and wipe. (which she is doing in the picture!) I am just so proud of her. She is growing up so fast. I cried a little on Monday just thinking about it all. She'll be 18 months old on July 4- what a big girl!

New York City

Last weekend Chuck and I went to New York City! We went with a group from church to go see the Yankees play in Yankee Stadium. For those of you that don't know, the Yankees are building a new stadium and this is their last year to play in the old stadium. Chuck really wanted to go and I (of course) was a little hesitant because we would be leaving Annalee for 3 nights. But we did it anyways. Annalee was fine. And we had a great time! (Thanks to all who watched her over the weekend. We really appreciated it!)

Friday morning we got to take a tour of Yankee Stadium. We got to go in the press box, dugout and got to go to Monument Park. This was Chuck's favorite part of the whole trip. That afternoon we took a bus tour of the city. It was a beautiful day (at times a little chilly) but it was a great day for this.

We stopped at Ground Zero. Talk about moving. This place was incredible. To actually be standing where all of that happened was- well, there are no words to describe it, but it really makes you think. That night we went to see the Yankees play the Royals. Fun!!!

Well, I want to put up so many more pictures, but I have little one wanting to go to bed. So, to end quickly- Saturday was filled with lots of walking (and it was much hotter than Friday!). We got out at all the places we wanted to see and all the shops we wanted to go into. We also walked through Central Park. We were so tired after the long day! All in all, New York is very different from here in Tennessee. Everyone seems to be in a hurry and everything is really BIG! It was so fun to go visit there though. I'm glad we went. So, to end here is an ode to some people we met on the streets of New York!

Time to Swim

Due to some minor problems we are all still awaiting the opening of Mama and Pop's pool- especially Annalee.So to fill the time and to cool her off from the hot weather until it's ready, they got her a Kiddie Pool to play in at their house. She loves it! (As you can see!)

She didn't know what to think of it at first, but as soon as I got in with her, she went to town! Sorry, there are no pics of me in the Kiddie Pool. : ) But it was fun! At one time we were both on our bellies kicking our feet as fast as we could. We were laughing so hard! It was a fun afternoon. The big pool is supposed to be ready by the weekend. I have a feeling she's going to have no problem jumping right in!