Statue Love

This statue was donated to Church of the Servant for the children. They are actually allowed to climb all over Jesus and Hadley loves to get to school a few minutes early so she can have her turn. Hudson loves to climb all over the statue also...

...and has grown quite fond of THIS little girl!

Checking out her nose,
giving hugs,
and lots of kisses!
As you can see from the different outfits, this didn't happen just once. He will actually run to her every single Monday and screams with delight to see her face again!

A little more brother/sister love...

A few more of my favorite pictures. It is simply amazing how much these two love each other. Hadley is the most incredible big sister and tolerates so much including hair pulling and biting. When she walks downstairs in the morning the first person she asks about is Hudson and when he sees her he squeals. He wants to kiss and hug her all the time and Hadley loves all the extra attention.

Some morning cartoons and it was really dark in the room. The flash obviously didn't make Hadley too happy and caused a terrified look on Hudson's face!

And my very favorite!!! Hudson was battling a terrible case of croup and Hadley had fallen asleep on the couch after preschool. Hudson crawled off my lap, onto Hadley's, and rested his head on her shoulder. Precious!

Hadley's got it figured out

The other day we were at Target and Hadley screamed the moment she saw this Barbie suitcase. She said, "Mommy, I HAVE to have this!!!" After telling her no because we were just there for groceries she said, "ok, well I will just ask Santa for it and he will get it for me."

And, as for having it figured out...Hadley decided she would pick out her own outfit to run a couple errands and go to Holland's house. When she came downstairs in this outfit she was just too proud of herself for me to not let her wear it. A longsleeve shirt with a tank top over it, leggings with gym shorts on top, and pocahontas dress up shoes. The best part was watching her smile ear to ear when people told her how cute she looked. And even better was me trying to convince her the next day to not wear it again.

A magazine surprise

The other day Hadley and I walked out to get the mail which, of course, was filled with another heaping pile of magazines. It amazes me how much wasted paper is put through circulation around the holidays. Anyway, we went back inside and I quickly sorted through the magazines, throwing out the ones we didn't need. Just as I was throwing away the last of the magazines I noticed that the front cover of "Home Mag" looked very similar to our house. Hadley, sitting right beside me, even noticed the same thing and said, "Mommy, that's our house." After looking a little closer I realized it WAS our house. Yes, it is only a local magazine and only an advertisement for Monte Cristo ironworks who made our front door, but it was still exciting and surprising to see they chose our front door.

Thankful...

We had such a great, yet busy, Thanksgiving this year. I could not be more thankful for my family and how much God has blessed us. I am also thankful that we don't have to travel anywhere for Thanksgiving and get to spend time with both families here. I am realizing that with a 4 year old and a 15 month old that is always in our arms I don't have a chance to take many pictures but I did manage to get a few to remember the fun week we had.

Wednesday evening we went to my mom and dad's house for Thanksgiving with my side of the family. Of course, lots of food but I think over 50% was desserts. And once again, my mom did a fabulous job hosting. It amazes me she still wants to make all the food and set up for everybody. My Grandma and Jody drove in from Eufaula and Story and her family came over as well. It was wonderful getting to spend time with everyone and see all the kids play together.

Here is a picture of Hadley (4), Story (almost 5), and Peyton (6). These girls get along uncommonly well and very rarely argue. They have so much fun playing together with Peyton usually running the show.

Of course, a silly pic...

Then Thursday morning we headed over to Matt's parents house for another fabulous meal put on by his mom. We each made a few items also and it was fun to participate in the Thanksgiving feast. Amy and her family came up from Dallas and Hadley was thrilled to see her cousins after 4 months! Jase and Lexi also joined us for their first Thanksgiving with the family and with 5 kids from 4-7 years old and a 15 month old it was loud, which only made it better! Here are a couple random pictures of the kids playing upstairs.

Kip, Amy, Katie, and Abby got to stay through the weekend and we packed it full of activities! First on the list: lunch, shopping, and Happy Feet 2 in 3-D. Here are the girls with glasses on and ready to go...

That evening we went to Shiki, a japanese hibachi steakhouse. Abby and Katie weren't too sure about the fire...
...and Hadley really didn't like it! This picture is right as he started a large fire and Hadley threw her hands up to protect her face.

Saturday morning we went to Sulfur for another Thanksgiving get-together. With 40 adults and 11 children it was a packed house with lots of food. Here is a picture of Hadley before we left. It is so rare for her to want me to take her picture anymore!

Hudson was thrilled to have another buddy to play with. Kase is 6 weeks older and Hudson immediately wanted to hug him when they saw each other. Kase, on the other hand, wasn't too accepting of the hug!
So Hudson decided to kiss him instead...

Worn out and a peaceful ride home for mommy and daddy!

A new day for our little ones

Picture courtesy of Hadley:

We have been incredibly blessed to have an amazing nanny for the past 14 months. She has loved our children as if they were her own grandchildren. She catered to Hadley's girly needs of having her fingernails painted, hair curled, and multiple outfit changes a day. And she became very attached to Hudson whom she has taken care of three days a week since he was 6 weeks old. It was not unusual for him to cry everytime she walked out the door and he always squealed with joy when she came in. Miss Julie took care of our kids better than we could have ever asked for and there was never a day at work that I worried about their needs being met. Unfortunately, we have stairs and with both kids bedrooms being upstairs, Julie's knees could not handle the up and down anymore. This was heartbreaking to us all and we will miss her dearly. I have been in search of a nanny for about a month now and we finally found a girl (Becca) that is beginning her first day tomorrow and the kids are excited to meet her. I know we will all adjust with time and Hadley and Hudson will grow to love their new nanny also!

We do not do red!

I had Hadley's parent teacher conference today and was thrilled to get such a good report! Mrs. James said she is amazed at how independent she is; always going potty on her own, putting up her backpack without being told to, and picking up all the toys she plays with. She said she listens well, knows all her numbers and letters, loves to color, loves to play with everyone, and always participates.

She told me the one word she would use to describe her is "happy." Of all words I can think of to describe my little girl, this may be one I would pick. Of course I want her to be smart, to have lots of friends, to be confident, but more than anything else, I want her to be HAPPY. It definitely made me smile to know Hadley is always happy away from home too.

So she also told me a funny story at the end of the conference. I may possibly lose some friends over this but it still made me laugh:

At the end of each school day the kids get to pick one skittle to eat if they have been good. Mrs. James said Hadley has never gotten her skittle taken away and she picks an orange one EVERY single time. Her teacher asked her why she always gets orange and Hadley said, "because I like 'go pokes' and it makes my daddy happy." She then asked her teacher which team she liked and Mrs. James answered, "my son went to OU so I am an OU fan." Hadley then responded with, "we DO NOT do red in our house!" Apparently, I have had little influence on my children and am clearly losing the battle....

Earthquakes!

Wow! The last 72 hours have been pretty eventful. It started Saturday morning at 2am when I was awakened to our entire house shaking. In my sleeping stupor I immediately thought we were having gas buildup in our house and it was about to explode. I jumped up, turned off the alarm, grabbed Hadley (Hudson was at my parents and Matt was out of town) and opened to door to run outside. This all happened in about 30 seconds and I finally woke up enough to realize we had just experienced an earthquake. In fact, a 4.7 magnitude and the second largest in Oklahoma's history. It only took me about an hour to fall back asleep and I got to teach Hadley what an earthquake was the next morning.

Then comes Saturday evening around 11:30. Earthquake #2. And much larger, in fact the largest in Oklahoma's history! Not as scary this time though, probably because I wasn't in a deep sleep. This time a magnitude of 5.6 and some pretty major damage occurred about an hour away from our house.

And finally, I am typing this tonight because my adrenaline is in high gear! After months of praying for rain, our prayers have been answered. Parts of Oklahoma have seen 9 inches of rain already and it's far from over because they are predicting rain all night long. The kids went to bed early because we are still adjusting to time change and Matt and I took this opportunity to relax together and watch t.v. This is something we very rarely get to do anymore. Literally, 5 minutes after getting comfortable we felt/heard the most unbelieveable crash and I was 100% positive we had just been hit by lightening. I ran upstairs to smell/look for any fire and Matt checked downstairs. We realized it must have just been nearby and just as our nerves calmed down we experienced earthquake #3 at another 4.7 magnitude! Moments later a few firetrucks passed by our house and as we ran to our window we saw them stop at our next door neighbor's house. So the lightening was close afterall! So here I am, heart still racing, and nowhere near falling asleep.

On average Oklahoma has 50 earthquakes a year. With one month left in 2011 we have already had over 1000 this year! Never thought we would need to take out earthquake insurance but I think it just may be in our future...

Peyton's 6th Birthday Party

Peyton's 6th birthday party was today and it was quite the party! She had a carnival theme party complete with a face-painting clown, bounce house, and ponies. It was perfect weather for the day and lots of kids! Now that she is in Kindergarten and the school has a policy of inviting all or none of the kids in the class, there were a lot of kids invited. Here are some of the pictures from the party...

Hudson with #1 Papa:
Peyton getting her face painted:


The ponies were a hit!
Hadley thought it was so cool that Peyton actually had ponies in her own backyard:

Lexi takes horse riding lessons and was a pro. She knew all the facts about the ponies and was so sweet at helping all the other kids ride the ponies:

Even Hudson got on one and LOVED it.
Papa was so proud of him. He didn't even need help holding on!






And a few more pictures of Hadley and Hudson playing peek-a-boo around the basketball goal. She loves to play with Hudson and he absolutely adores her!

Such a fun party...Happy Birthday, Peyton!