Everly's first camping trip

So, I thought I would make a list of the lessons we learned from taking Everly camping for the first time. Some have to do with her, others don't.

Top Ten Lessons (In order that they were learned)

1. Don't take the Causeway bridge at rush hour, unless you want to jump off it! 

2. Do have your dinner ready when you arrive, get the fire started and get cooking fast! That way you can feed your toddler while you set up the tent.

3. Do use your truck lights to see as you set your tent up in the dark (grr.... traffic!).

4. Don't forget the pack-n-play!!! Then you'll have a toddler sharing the air mattress with you.

5. Two year-olds don't know how to sleep in sleeping bags, no matter how cute it is (or is it just our child??).

6. 50's in the evenings means long pants.

7. Do bring a bag of sticks and some newspaper to get the fire started; Don't forget some logs to keep it going!

8. When you're pregnant, try to sleep as close to the bathroom as you can. 

9. Warning: When you camp right next to the playground, your toddler will not understand the need to set-up, cook, tear-down--they will just want to go play, all the time!

10. Camping with kids is a lot more work, but it's worth it to see them experience what you love. 

We have tons of pictures on our camera that I need to download--from before Everly's birthday! I'll try to do that soon. Thanks for reading :)

I thought this was cute...

I wasn't feeling very good so I told Everly that I wanted to lay down and that she could either play or rub my back. I showed her how and she did it, but then went running to the back of the house I thought to play in her room. She came back quickly with our back massager knuckles that she found once and we showed her what they were, and continued to rub my back. Ahhhh, what a nice little girl, and sooooo smart!

Childhood

I love these recent pictures of Everly. They tell so much about her life and I decided to label them what I thought they said about her. enjoy! :)

sweet.

serious.

tender.

innocence.

joy.

exciting.

contemplative.

Everly's little bedroom makeover

Hi! This is Everly- welcome to my newly decorated room. Let me show you around.

My door has a new sign on it to replace the piggy one.

We also replaced "Oink" with my name, the pig picture with this one my mom's had since she was little, and put up a pretty piggy bank- I have so many to choose from! :)

Here's my new bed- I just love it! Today I got in it all by myself at 11:30 for a nap!

Daddy is silly!

This is my new table that I love to sit and color at. Mommy put these pretty "flies" (as she calls butterflies!) up on my wall.

Daddy showed me how to get in my bookshelf- it was lots of fun!

Mommy and I watched the TV all morning yesterday about the new President...

And here's my mommy's new herb garden that she got for Christmas- she is very excited how fast they are growing!


Thanks for looking at my room with me!

First haircut & big girl bed!

Finally, this Saturday we went to get Everly's first haircut! The lady did it soooo quickly which I'm guessing is best for squirmy toddlers, but I was sad that it didn't last longer! Everly did pretty well too- she had to keep looking down at a toy so the lady could cut it and she is just the best little girl!
Before...

hehehe... during!

Trying to keep her looking down at the toy...

And, after! Ain't she cute? :)



We also found a used and free toddler bed for Everly and set that up last weekend. Every one warned me about this process, but Everly hasn't been difficult going to bed at all! She even crawls into her bed all by herself and sometimes during the day pretends to go "Night night!" :) She loves it, and we had a Disney Princess blanket and table/chair to match it already. Our baby is growing up!!! (I'll get some pics soon!)

...I know it's been months since we've posted--now that life is getting back to normal after Christmas I will try to keep up a little better! thanks to all of you who post and share your lives with us! :)

November is flying by!

I can't believe I haven't posted on here for almost a month! crazy. I always want to put pictures on and I never get around to it. :( well, a little update..

We are so busy these days. I started helping at a Christian dance studio in our Parish called Leap of Faith. In exchange for my help, Everly is taking her first dance class for free! I know... she's only 20 months old--we've thought about taking her out and doing it next year, but she seems to like it, after she gets over crying when Mommy leaves. The first night we went she was a champ, but her babysitter Emma was there that night helping and she doesn't anymore. The second time Mommy didn't make it back to her room right away and she cried until I got there. The third time there were other babies already crying when we got there, so needless to say she cried and I stayed for a while hoping that she would get into it, especially when they started Tumbling, cause that's her favorite! She can now do a somersault all by herself on our bed! :) very proud.

So, last week we decided I should just drop her off and leave. Her teacher Hope took her and told us that after about 5 minutes of crying she was having fun, pointing her toes and everything! So, we've decided to keep taking her- I help with 11-13 year olds during her class so it all works out. I also go another night to help with the Competition Team and am going to start dancing Modern with some of the older girls. So, it's been fun, a little hectic, and just taking some time to get used to the studio and how things are run.

I didn't grow up in a dance studio so it's all kinda new--we've already done 2 fundraisers! Today was the second-a fashion show and the girls got to go to a local dance store and pick dance attire to model. The moms made a bunch of food that the older girls served before the show started, and Everly modeled a pink tutu! After waiting with all the girls for her turn, she was crying for her mom, but she did a great job walking the runway with Grace, an older girl. Here's a pictures of our little dancer and I put a video on YouTube--check out our new video bar on the left-pretty nifty! :)

Trick-or-Trunk!

It's our third year to be a part of St. Bernard's Trick-or-Trunk, started in 2006 for kids to have some Halloween fun after Katrina. This year our team decided to be super heros and painted some comic book scenes and cutouts to decorate our truck. We had a bunch of candy, but we had over 2000 things of popcorn to hand out too that a friend from here donated! There were a little over 2000 kids, I believe, because the people next to us had 2000 cups to handout and were just a shy short. It was a lot of fun for the kids--we were one of the last vehicles and they were really excited to see a bunch of their favorite super heros in person ;). Here are some pictures from the day that our friend Amanda took.

Here we are- Aaron was Flash, I was Super Girl, and Everly was batgirl! She was really excited to dress up- we had been practicing the batman theme song with batgirl in it for a month now!


Here's our group with our friends: Parish President Craig and local business man Mark.


Our counselor and his wife, Ron and Becky Koval, were Everly's "bat family"! They're daughter is whose wedding Everly is in in December.


This took us over 3 days to do! It was tedious but a lot of creative fun! :)



The kids could take pictures as Wonder Woman (here's Everly)...


...or Super Man! Since I was Super Girl we had to take a picture :)


A lot of the kids wanted to take pictures with us...


...a lot were dressed like us!...


...and some we're afraid of us, especially Lucas as the Thing from the Fantastic Four!


Some of our new friends joined us later in the day as the Incredibles- they are Robert, David, Meghan and Liz- all from Clemson University and living and serving here now at the Methodist Church and coming to the Gathering too.


By the end of the day, Everly was all tuckered out! But not too tired to climb up into the steering wheel!


She looked like she was resting here, but really she is reaching for my phone! sneaky girl :)