{Christmas}

So excited for Christmas. 

            

Loving our fresh pjs from Mimi:)

 We laid out some cookies for Santa...Eva ate most of them:)

Our annual game of Train...where I win. Always. 

The Singing of Christmas Carols...Yes we have a family band.

And singing to our Favorite Birthday Uncle...he turned 29+alot;)

I didn't take a lot of pictures this year.  Truly enjoyed just being with the family and watching a full days worth of Turtle Man (quite possibly the dumbest show on television) 

//::M E R R Y  C H R I S T M A S::\\

{Lu Loses her First Tooth}

//:b e f o r e:\\

//:d u r i n g:\\

               

//:a f t e r:\\

{Jellybeans makes Animal sounds, and says "I Love Lu"}

{Lu and Jellybean and a Christmas Photobooth}

{Lu and Jellybean see Santa}

Clearly Jellybean loves Santa;)

{Jelly Bean gets a Bath and blows kisses}

One of my favorite moments of Eva right now is when she gets out of the bath and runs in her towel from my bathroom to her room. All you see and hear is a little towel with legs running and screaming happily begging for someone to come and pinch her little rear. The whole situation is weirdly hilarious.  Im sure Sam and I won't think its cute, her running around asking for her butt to be pinched, in the next 15 years, but none the less it's a precious memory to us now:)

{Lu and Jellybean are getting a New Sibling!!}

{Lu is sweet}

Sam and I flew to Chicago for the weekend.  As we waited for our plane to take off, I opened my book and found this sweet note tucked inside.

I love Bella, and her gift of showing love so quietly.  

{Jellybean is a Dancing Queen}

{Halloween}

Lu loves all things Alice and Wonderland. She decided this year she wanted to be the Queen of Hearts and Jellybean be Alice.  Awful cute if you ask me:)

          

{Jellybean and her idol}

{Lu is a Lion}

This is an oldie but goodie.  Back in 2008 we went to Destin, FL for our yearly family vacation.  On our last day its tradition we get all fancied up, have dinner on the beach, and take pictures. As we were all getting ready Bella, unknowing to all of us, made videos of herself singing.  The best part of this video was that it was over 45 minutes long.  The video captured Bella singing and making silly faces for 45 minutes while in the back ground you hear my sister and I fighting over dresses, Mom panicking about her hair, and the boys not caring or whining about taking pictures.  I loved all 45 minutes of it. Here is my favorite part of the video. Enjoy.

{Jellybean looks like Mrs. Brady}

{Lu and Jellybean go to a Pumpkin Patch}

She seriously picked up just about every single pumpkin you see behind her. She finally chose this lucky pumpkin to be hers:)

{Lu and Jellybean play}

Reason #2834283478925 Why Jellybean gets called Monster. 

{Jelly Bean is a Mocking bird}

Eva, all day everyday, is gibbering about something.  You know what she is saying or how she feels depending on her volume and her facial expressions. Here lately, her gibberish has been turning into something we actually can understand.  The other day I dropped something and said to myself "Aw Man" and then in the other room I hear the faintest of sounds- a high pitch "Aw man".  I giggled and thanked Jesus I didn't say something my Nana would say when she drops something;)

{Lu gets to see Justin Bieber }

Living in Nashville is non-stop excitement. Last Wednesday night was no exception.  All day the news was telling us a "Semi-Famous Artist" was having Main Street in Franklin shut down for a music video shoot.  We didn't think anything of it, until we get a call from our sweet friend Kathryn telling us we immediately needed to get Bella to downtown Franklin because the "semi-famous" artist was none other than JUSTIN BIEBER! And to top it off Selena Gomez was there with him.  In the world of Bella this would be like her getting to see Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez:) There is nothing that can top that at this moment in Bells life:) When we told her what we were doing she started screaming  and jumping up and down and then immediately said "I can't go, I have a spelling test in the morning." We died laughing, that was a totally Bella thing to say. Only Bella would be getting the chance to meet her idols, and be worried about school- we joke and say she is a 40-year old business women stuck in a six year old body, she is so mature for her age:)  I still have never seen such excitement! Keep in mind she is our stone face, over-thinker, silent child.  You never know how she really feels about something.  So to see her scream and jump up and down was incredible and shocking. On the way to Franklin we blasted  "Love Me" by Bieber and "Love you like a Love Song" by Gomez.  Bella was singing at the top of her lungs and giggling the whole way there. We get there and meet up with Kathryn and get a front row spot outside of his bus.  We waited, and waited, and waited.  People would come in and out out of the bus but no Bieber.  We finally came up with a 5 second rule.  When the girls started screaming we would slowly count to 5, if it was not Bieber the screams would be dead before we got to 5, if we got to 5 it was the Biebs.  We played this game for about an hour. All during this Bella was worried about her spelling test. There was a teacher in the crowd with us, and she said some comforting words to Bella and so she was finally able to enjoy herself.  The kind words came just in time.  The screams started and 5 seconds later the screams were loud and going strong. The next thing Bella knows Justin Bieber is walking 5 feet away from her, swinging his hair, smiling and waving.  She screamed, giggled, and was jumping up and down {have I mentioned she is not that kid!- she is the kid that got a barbie jeep for Christmas, opened it, looked at it, and gave no expression-StoneFace. She just stared at it} After we saw him we ran around to the main street and watched a little of the filming of his video for "Mistletoe".  After a few Bella was ready to call it a night. The experience was incredible. Definitely a night to remember.

{Lu has a Girl Crisis}

 Every school girl dreads Gym day.  You can't wear pretty dresses, or pretty shoes, and you get all sweaty and are forced to play dodge ball, or climb a rope all while dumb boys you pretend to not like are watching, and or hitting you with dodge balls. 

 Well my Lu is no exception to this dreaded hated gym day. And this week makes it worse because she has school pictures ON gym day. So she was forced to wear gym shoes with a dress.  A NoNo in Lu's book. To make matters worse this is the second year in a row picture day has landed on her gym day.
So now we hate picture day, and rightly so. 

{k i n d e r g a t e n // f i r s t}

{Lu and Jellybean go to the country}

We went to the hills of Kentucky this weekend to visit my cousins and Aunt.  We rode horses, four wheelers, ate great food, and laughed. A lot. It was a great get away weekend.  The best part: no cell phone service.  It was great because we were all so engaged the entire weekend with each other, and not what was happening outside of us.   

 Oh.  I failed to mention Jellybean was scared to death of the real horse.  So my aunt found a better option for her.  She is SO her mothers daughter:)

After my Aunts house we went further into the hills, and went to the family cemetery. Every September we get together and have a church service. Since its the only time my Aunts get the whole family together for church, they find it necessary to hire as many pastors as they can find.  This year we only had 3. So it only lasted 3 hours- thats short compared to years past:) Needless to say Jellybean got restless, so we wondered around the graveyard to look at the stones. Jesus was her favorite:) Mainly because she is in this stage where she finds it necessary to honk peoples noses, and she could honk his nose. Yes. My Jellybean honked Jesus's nose.  I'm sure he loved it.

{Favorite Way to talk to Jellybean}

Her on one side of the bed, me on the other:)

{Jellybean Makes a Mess}

and is proud of it. 

{Lu goes to First Grade}

Today Lu starts first grade. She changed outfits 6 times before I forced her to wear the 6th outfit.  This was it. She was not happy. 

See.

Then we get to school after the rough start at home to find out she is the only girl in the class who has to sit at a table with ALL boys. So the crying began, again. 

                               See.

 Rough first day. Praying this isn't an indication of the school year. We shall see...