underwater pic.

happy friday!

swim little fish, swim!!

sarah kate did it! she completed her 4th and final day of swim lessons this afternoon!

we are so proud of her! she did great! we got to sit there on the edge of the pool today and watch. lindsey showed us everything they have been working on and what we can do in the pool to keep practicing. 2 things are major: holding breath and kicking legs=)


"look, mom, i can kick..."



"and hold my breath..."

kicking with mrs. lindsey...




for 2-year olds, the 4 kiddos did a great job sitting, listening and taking turns!


stella just wanted to practice her kick while receiving instructions...too cute!


time for jumping....foard goes first....


then stella!


sarah kate's turn!! jumping is a big deal for her! she's so cautious and afraid of falling!


splash!




and again!






swimming underwater from lindsey to jennifer....


i took my point and shoot so of course i didn't get the actual underwater action!

coming up in mrs. jennifer's arms....




we are proud of sarah kate for doing so well and for being excited about it! we feel like mrs. lindsey laid a great foundation for our future fish! =)


“When life gets you down, you know whatcha got to do? Just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming swimming swimming.” -Dory (from Finding Nemo)

piggy tails.

i forget about piggy tails. i'm doing good to get sk's crazy hair combed each morning. she asked for "piggy TAILS" this morning so i put her hair up. it hurts her to have it put up but once it's up she is so thrilled to see herself in the mirror. she told the check-out girl at target that she was wearing "piggy TAILS." (in case the lady didn't notice....wink.)

they aren't even. it would take some time to get them just right and i only have a really small window of opportunity to get them up before a meltdown occurs. i think it's probably easier to pull straight hair through rubberbands. pulling those ringlets through is a little tricky!


she took froggy and lamby with her out to the mailbox to mail off another batch of thank-you notes. she loves to get and send off mail.

trash day. always makes for pretty pics=)


kind of hard to lift her up and take a pic, but she likes to put the letters in, close the door and put the flag up. i wish she liked to write the notes....haha!








our neighbor's lab gave birth to 11 puppies on saturday!! the sonogram only showed 5...what a surprise! i'm so glad that sort of thing doesn't happen to humans....i'd die if i came out of delivery with 6 more babies than expected. poor ella. 3 didn't make it, but they have 8 healthy 4 day old pups over there. i took sk over to see them. i wish i had gotten a pic but i was too busy making sure she didn't touch! she can play with them in a couple of weeks. right now they are just so small and delicate! their eyes aren't even open yet and ella (mommy dog) is real protective. i could tell that she didn't want sk getting too close. sk was kind of loud....PUPPIES MOMMY!!! WOOK!!

the heat index was 120 degrees here today. it was smoldering. her playset was too hot to even play on by the time we went out so she just went over to look at it;)


maybe trey will have time to get the monkey bars on this weekend...they'll go off the back.

tomorrow is our last day of swim lessons. we'll be able to sit close by tomorrow during the lesson and lindsey (the instructor) will show us everything that we need to be working on. i'll be able to get some pics tomorrow and if i'm not able to get any then lindsey is definitely getting some and emailing them to us. she's bringing her underwater camera. i stay out of view for the most part, but i know today that sarah kate jumped in the water, held her breath correctly, kicked, and went under. she's loving it! doesn't hurt that she gets a lollipop at the end of the lesson! she can't wait to get to me when her lesson is over so i can get that wrapper off for her. she had never had a lollipop before these lessons.


you'd think sk would grow tired of eating bbq chicken at every meal....we had so many left overs from her party! but she certainly cleared her plate today. who can blame her?? hometeam bbq is the best there is!


so that's how my girl spent her day in piggy tails. even wore her tails to her lesson and was so excited when her teacher commented on them! she fluffed them with her hand and smiled and said, "piggy tails!" she's a mess. oh, AND, she gave her daddy a makeover tonight....complete with a good hair brushing from her princess brush, a roller in his hair and "lipstick". she told him that he was a princess. beau got a princess makeover too. must be very interesting to be a father of a little girl. before men become fathers i do not think they sit around daydreaming about the day when their child finally makes them over into a beautiful princess. trey plays along beautifully and is a great sport! beau on the other hand........that's a different story.
;)

two.

sarah kate is officially a two year old - we had her 2 yr. checkup yesterday to confirm...haaaa!

every good day starts with pretending to be a princess. it's just the best way to begin a day! yesterday, sarah kate started out as cinderella. trey bought her a cinderella dress and jewels for her birthday - she even has clip-on earrings. she is so proud! now she can be princess belle and princess cinderella anytime she wants. we are going to be so prepared for our december disney trip! we already have a deep love for mickey and his whole gang and NOW we know and love princesses.....can't wait.

princess cinderella checked out very well at her appointment. she was 26.6 pounds. she didn't stand straight for her measurements really....the nurse wrote down 33 inches but i'm not so sure about that! i meant to have trey measure her last night but forgot.....sk's lala and dougie gave her a growth chart for her bday so we'll have to mark it on there and see how tall she is.

her 2 year molars on the bottom are about to pop through any second and then the ones on the top aren't far behind....she could see them too but the bottom ones were already starting to break through. that would explain the infant-like drooling from time to time....

dr. caristi was very pleased with her language. sarah kate has had quite a few little ear infections and one major double ear infection so verbal development can be a concern when a child suffers from alot of ear infections. sk never stopped talking the whole time the dr. was with us which was great because the dr. got to really evaluate her language and she's just doing great, thankfully. sk has more words in her vocab than i can even count at this point. and dr. c says that even the words that only trey and i understand are counted as "words" since she knows what she's talking about! =) even though the dr. isn't worried about her language development, if she has one more infection before summer is over then we'll be referred to an ENT to have her checked out. evaluated for tubes i guess.....so we'll just wait and see how she does throughout the remainder of the summer before any decisions are made there. her ears looked "beautiful" yesterday at least!

we are to wait until sk shows interest in the potty before starting potty training. sk could care less about using the potty so we'll be holding off until she shows us a sign! she knows all about the potty and what goes on in there and she's very happy to tell trey and i all about it (pretty sure i haven't had privacy since the child started walking) however, she's very content in her diapers!


sk had her birthday party on saturday! she really had a blast during the party with her friends and family. then after the party she had the most fun playing with ava and bryce. she wants to be exactly like them and will do anything they do! she had all her favorite people (trey's parents, my parents, and my brother's fam) in our house for a long time saturday evening and she was in heaven! she stayed up playing until after 10! they danced, giggled, played hide and seek, watched "tangled", opened all sk's bday gifts, and just played & played. i think that 3rd cupcake put the bday girl over the edge....she was so hyper! =)


how cute is her little crab coverup=) lovebugz (anna love) designed it for me.

we haven't had rain in mt. pleasant all summer. seriously. it has threatened to rain some but we haven't received hardly any. UNTIL.....it was sk's bday party weekend!


i can't really complain about the rain when we've prayed for it. our grass needed it and folkston REALLY needed it & they got some too. her bday party didn't get rained out but it did start to rain towards the end of it. everyone got to play and eat and all so it worked out fine. all but one of her friends came inside and played for a little while before going home.

i made her cupcakes and cupcake toppers but didn't get a real good pic of them. her toppers were crabs (aka "prabs") and sailboats. she had a crab-themed party which i chose because of her crab bathing suit. the kids wore their suits and played in the baby pools, at the water table and on sk's new playset. =)







cutie pies....charlotte and alden...


ava bug, sk and charlotte....


mr. liam.....he loved all the balloons and beach balls=)


jennifer and stella....




sk has had some practice blowing out candles and i do believe she's mastered it! she helped her dad and mr. kyle both blow out their bday candles. then she blew out a candle on her actual bday, so she knew exactly what to do with that ole flame on saturday! she can get some serious air through those cutie pie front 2 teeth!









we opened gifts with just the family. ava bug helped SO much! she and i opened most of the presents and sk dug through the gift bags. brycie bear is in this pic ....satisfying her sweet tooth! love all those girls so much=)


ava bug:


brycie bear:


on sunday we went to breakfast with mimi, papa, jon-jon, ashley and the twins. it was ashley's birthday!! we asked bryce how old her mom was and she thought for a minute and then said, "twenty-four." yep. of course we told her that she was exactly right! ashley spent the day with her sweet little family in charleston. she said it was one of the best birthdays she's had which i was really glad to hear. she shared her bday with sk's party last year and then this year she traveled on her bday because of sk's party! can't think of anyone better for sk to share her bday weekends with, but we don't want to take over aunt ashley's big day! turning 24 is a big hairy deal! ;)

our 2 year old started swim lessons this week....monday - thursday at 5pm! she's in with a group of 4 two year olds. the instructor is really fabulous with them and they are doing great! sk started out great yesterday and then had a complete meltdown.....not sure what happened exactly because us 'moms' are kind of hiding out of view. but today she did perfect. no tears at all and she just enjoyed it! she went under and did great with everything. except for blowing bubbles....we're supposed to work on that in the bathtub....they all still want to suck in water when they go under.
we swam with alden and amy this morning. sk can just swim and swim in her little puddle-jumper. so can alden. they're sweet little friends=)


anyway, we are really really proud of sarah kate. she's very fun and she's a sweet girl! sure, she exhibits those undesirable typical 2-yr old behaviors from time to time, but for the most part she is just a joy....truly! so happy 2nd birthday, sweet sarah kate! being your mom is the best job i've ever had!


i forgot that i had taken a few pics of her decorations a while back. i'm going to download them and put them below. i hand cut all those darn crabs and sailboats so i really think i should document it somewhere! next year, i'm thinking trey and i should take sk to disney for her bday since it's free up until their 3rd bday. then after that, i think i'll have her bday party at our local water park. i'm done with all the planning and decorating and everything that comes along with hosting a party. her first 2 parties were just adorable and so special and i'm glad we did it! but now it's on to 'easy.' ha!

everything is 2-sided....the big crabs went in the potted flowers for center pieces and the small crabs were cupcake toppers...

the banner hung above the food table and was too small for the space. but it was a cute banner!




and lastly, a big thanks to our parents (& jon-jon's fam) for all they did to help out during her big party weekend! y'all are loved and appreciated! and sk misses you all very much!