My Girl

My girl is growing too! I can't believe that she will be in kindergarten is just a year and a half! 

She will be starting dance in the fall. We went to check it out a few weeks ago and she just kept saying "how do they do all that without messing up?!"

For her birthday Ms Sarah got her a craft for them to do together. She got to paint wooden flowers for our front entryway. We are so blessed with friends that love our kids!

Big girl before school one day

Our neighbors recently got a puppy, 

which you know Hailey is thrilled about. 

She loves to visit and take him for walks. Maybe this will buy us a few more years before we have to get one. Ha!

Hailey knows her daddy loves baseball and the Yankees. She picks out her Yankees shirt whenever it's clean just for daddy. 

One day when Reece was napping Hailey and I did a few educational things. This girl is a master at sorting. I only let her do this one because she asked to use the foam stickers. The number page she dos independently after I showed her how to do one. 

Now if only I could get her that excited about writing her name...

Me: "Hailey, you're getting too big. You're supposed to stay little forever."

Hailey: "No mommy! I'm supposed to grow!"

I love this little (big) girl to pieces!

Getting Too Big

I'm noticing more and more that Reece is no longer a baby but a toddler and little boy. 

He has always loved remotes but will now actually sit and watch a few minutes of a tv show or video on my phone. He loves the videos from fisher price. 

Where did the baby go?

Our friends and neighbors got a new puppy and we've spent some time play with him and walking him. You know Hailey absolutely loves every second but Reece is still pretty skeptic. He doesn't mind big dogs but is scared of little ones. If Reece is just walking around and scully starts to follow him, Reece runs away screaming. It's sad but a little funny too. 

But puppies and toddlers are the same! I can't tell you how many times I said, "Reece don't put that in your mouth."  "Scully, don't eat that." "Reece stay near mommy." "Scully, come back." :)

He loooves the dog that lives behind us. Anytime we are in the kitchen he looks out the window for Buddy and if we're in the backyard he tries to climb the hill to get to him. 

Trying to be a big boy and brush his teeth like Hailey. 

Playing with his truck 

And this sweet boy picked me flowers for the first time yesterday. Melt my heart!

I love this growing boy!

NC State Farm Days

Each year NC State puts on a program for families called Farm Days. They have lots of animals, booths set up about agriculture and their famous Howling Cow ice cream. Last year was our first time going. 

Reece was so tiny! And Hailey looked so little too! 

This year the kids were all in it! They loved looking at the animals. Reece cracked me up standing on his tip toes at every pen just so he didn't miss anything. 

And he really wanted to be face to face with this goat. He walked about 5 feet across the hay bales and stuck his face right into his. 

Hailey's favorite part was holding the baby chicks. In fact, when I told her we were going to Farm Days she said "Is that where I got to hold a baby chick in the red trough?" What?!  That girl forgets NOTHING!

Reece wanted nothing to do with the chicks and only poked them when we tried to get him to pet them. Ha!

The kids (and Ryan) enjoyed climbing on some tractors. 

We picked up some NC State footballs,

Hailey milked a cow,

Ground some corn

And then it was time for our favorite part. Ice cream! It was only 9:30 in the morning but who can pass up ice cream?!

We were all big fans! Thanks NC State for sharing your farm animals with us!

My two monkeys

Our Sunday pictures...

I love them!

Springtime Fun

We have been enjoying every minute of the warm spring weather we've had over the last few weeks. The fact that the temperature keeps swinging back and forth between spring temperatures and cold weather makes us want to soak it up all the more. 

We're going to have a garden this year! Ryan built a wall on our back hill to create a little garden bed for me and I'm so excited to grow our own veggies! We planted our second round of seeds this past weekend. (The first ones we did too early and they got too big for the pots they were in before we could transfer them outside.) 

And around our cul-de-sac spring means birthday season! Out of the 8 kids, 7 of them have spring birthdays, including my own. So we have been enjoying our fair share of birthday parties and birthday play dates. Last weekend was Ty's and they did it at the same place we had Hailey's last year. She had a blast at the gym and remembered some of it from her party. 

My cuties on Sunday morning. Hailey is wearing a dress my Mom made for us when we were little 

And my poor scratched-face boy 

We got to enjoy a special spring treat this week too! Our local strawberry patch opened early for berry picking because there was supposed to be a frost. My babies loved eating those fresh strawberries. I did most of the picking, they were too busy eating ;)

Reece wasn't too happy to have to leave and give up the strawberries he had in his hand. 

We will definitely be back to pick again soon!

Hailey got to sing for the moms involved in our Bible study this week. She was so excited that daddy could come watch. She yelled to him from the stage! She was much calmer than when they sang in the fall and even sat down halfway thru. Ha!

It has been busy and even stressful at times serving in the children's program this year, but it has been fun and such a blessing to see these kids learn more about Jesus each week! It's just one more thing that will be wrapping up soon for the spring/summer. 

And just because it's cute...Reece LOVED his lasagna the other night. Can you tell?!

We can't wait for the spring weather to stay! We have so much more fun to have!