5 Minutes

I went upstairs to get Derrick out of his crib and I came down to find this. I was gone maybe five minutes.

My New Best Friend

I met Shannon Hale!! A couple Saturdays ago I found out she was in Indy and was going to do a book signing, so you'd better believe I was there along with a good friend and her daughter. Oh man was I giddy. I LOVE Shannon Hale's books. For those of you who are clueless as to what her books are, she's written Austenland, The Actor and a Housewife, Midnight in Austenland, The Goose Girl, The Princess Academy, and much more. I just love the way she writes. She's so funny.

I pretty much told her I loved her...like three times. She showed me some pictures on her laptop that she had taken while they were filming Austenland in England, because yes, they are making it into a movie! She wanted to hold Derrick, but he wasn't having it. He doesn't know how lucky he is. I was pretty jealous. haha. jk. kinda.

Anyways, I was pretty much on cloud nine that day, and the next. Still am. Can you tell I like her books? I really do feel like if she lived by me we could be good friends. :)

I got her to autograph my very worn Austenland, and then I bought Midnight in Austenland for her to sign for me, and The Goose Girl and The Princess Academy for her to sign for Megan, because I think all girls should read them.

What a great time.

We're looking at the pictures on her computer.

See? What'd I tell you...Best Friends!

Tennessee

For Presidents Day weekend I loaded up the kiddos and headed down to good ole Tennessee to visit my good friend/cousin-in-law, Sydney. Bo has been doing ICU, so I knew he wouldn't be home AT ALL, and Dave, Syd's husband, had just taken off to Japan for three weeks, so we decided us honorary widows would get together and have fun!

We were there Saturday through Tuesday, and the kids and I had a blast talking, playing, and relaxing with the Heslops. Just last night Megan was talking about her best friend Logan. :)

The kids played with the legos and dart guns and everything else on Saturday and Sunday, and then on Monday we loaded up everyone and took them to the Memphis Zoo. Dave's mom, Linda, was with Syd too so that she could help out preggers Sydney (due in June) and the boys while Dave was gone. Linda was awesome. I felt bad, but she did most of the cooking and dishes. She insisted that she loved doing it though. Twist my arm. haha.

It was really fun. I'm glad we live closer to them so that we can have somewhere fun to go, within a fairly easy driving distance, on those three day weekends. Not to mention that they are our good friends AND family. I'm glad our kids get along pretty well too, but that is a minor detail. :)

Syd's gonna kill me for adding this photo! haha. L to R is Logan, Sydney, Sam, and Linda.

Believe it or not, it was much easier to just lift up the stroller so Derrick could see the animals than to get him in and out all day long.

Talking to the elephant guy.

We found this dinorsaur, obviously not complete, in a chained off section and naturally went around the chain, got on top of the dinosaur, and took pictures.

cutie patooties.

Derrick LOVED the fish. He would've loved Moody Gardens.

Derrick watching the penguins swim in the water.

I thought this was HILARIOUS. Note that the Statue of Liberty is holding the Ten Commandments and a Cross. Under the statue it says something like America return to Christ. Classy.

Derrick's First Birthday!

My baby is ONE. Actually he's been one for a couple of weeks now... haha.

Derrick is a Valentine's baby, but we didn't actually celebrate his birthday on Valentine's Day because Bo was at work ALL.DAY.LONG. So instead we celebrated it a few days later when he had a day off.

We took Derrick and the kids, you know... those other ones who shall not be named (jk), to a local bouncy house place. The kids had so much fun jumping around and going down the slide. Derrick wasn't too hot about the idea at first, but then warmed up to it towards the end.

That night we had cake and presents. Derrick got some bath toys, which the older kids promptly claimed, and thats about it. Hey, he's one, and he has older siblings who already have all the toys a kid could need, so he has plenty of things to keep him entertained.

I was lame this year. I'm sorry Derrick. I had grand dreams of making a super awesome cake and having a super awesome family party, but when it came right down to it, I was tired, I was frazzled, and you, you won't remember anyways. Besides, you got a cake all to yourself, which is really all anyone ever wants anyways. ;)

Derrick didn't know what to do with the cake. I envisioned him plowing into it. I envisioned him laughing while plunging those cute baby hands into the cake. I even in envisioned him looking at me with those gorgeous brown eyes and telling me that he loves me and that I'm the bomb-diggity (okay not really on the last one). :)

Instead he just dipped a finger in and licked it. Then he did again. Thats it. Finally I fed him a bite and he started enjoying it. He still wouldn't feed himself the cake though until I gave him the spoon. Funny kid.

So that's it. My baby is one. He's walking, he has around four teeth, he sorta says "Mama", he LOVES his brother and sister. He loves to throw anything and everything, especially down the stairs. He adores Bo, he gives me hugs all the time. He is taking bottles (YAY)! He drinks whole milk. He thinks the world revolves around him, which it does. He is a wonderful, wonderful baby. And yes, I'm still calling him a baby, even if he IS a one year old now. Because I am not even close to having another one anytime soon, so he will be called baby for as long as it takes.

I'm a Big Kid Now

Derrick is now a forward facing carseat traveler!! He looks so tiny in it!

I went to the Dr.'s the other day and they told me how the Pediatrics Assoc. has now said that kids should be rear facing until 2 years. Yeah, good luck with that. (Just WHERE do they think the kids legs are supposed to go???) My kid is the mandated 20 lbs and one year, so forward facing it is. He loves it and enjoys being able to see where we're going. Megan loves it even more because now she gets a girly booster seat with a seat belt she can take off. yeah..that part isn't so fun.

He doesn't look excited, I know, but trust me, he is.

And just because this next picture is funny.... this is how we found Carter sleeping the other day!

My Parents visited!

My parents came to visit...in January. hahaa. Talk about being way behind on blogging.

Southwest had this awesome deal where you got half off tickets if you flew on these certain days, so we took advantage of that and got tickets for my parents!

My parents and I kept the trip a secret from my kids so that when the day came for them to visit, my kids were totally surprised. It was really fun. My parents flew in at midnight, so the next morning the kids came into my room all confused and wondering if I knew that Grandpa was in Megan's room. When I started acting clueless they REALLY started getting confused. hahhaa.

Best surprise ever.

Anyways, sadly enough I hardly got any pictures. We were BUSY. See, part of the reason my parents came was so that they could help me with some of the projects in my house. We painted a wall, we put in a new wood front entry, and we redecorated. My house looks pretty good. I really do mean to get around to taking pictures of it...

My parents also watched the kids on Friday and Saturday so that Bo and I could take an overnight trip down to Louisville,KY and visit the temple. That was SO WONDERFUL. I want to do that again! :)

So yep, that was a couple weeks ago, sadly, and we all wish it were still going on. My kids love my parents and beg to go to Washington to their house all the time.

Here are the few pictures I took while they were here. It's from a trip to the Children's Museum (shocker) that we took while they were here. They opened up a new exhibit, Mr. Potato Head, and we were there on the first day to test that bad boy out.

The only picture of my mom. Since she doesn't read my blog, she won't be mad that the picture kinda blurred her over. haha.

A first, and I mean A FIRST

I was playing Mario Kart with Carter yesterday. I haven't played in a loooooong time, so needless to say, I wasn't playing too well. You most definitely know you aren't playing well when your 6 year old son tells you, "It's okay mom, if you want you can switch me guys, since mine is faster." or "Yay Mom, you can do it! Keep going, you can do it. Oh good job, Mom!" How sad is it that my little boy felt the need to boost my self esteem? hahahaa
In other news, I took Carter to get his 6 year check up today. He is in the 10th percentile for height and 25th for weight. Hmmmm... we need to work on that. :)