Photo Shoot & Half Birthday

We did a little "photo shoot" before church last week. I love these sweet pictures!

Josie also turned 2 1/2 last week!

Josie, you continue to amaze us everyday! I love your bright smile that melts my heart, silly personality, sweet manners, nurturing instincts, and EVERYTHING else wonderful about you! As trying as the "terrible two's" have been for us at times, I still think this is such a fun stage in your life. Your personality is shining through more and more! Some of my favorite things about this stage in your life include:

- Hearing your sweet prayers every night. Your prayers are so honest and it amazes me what all you think of to pray for (some of the funniest ones include praying for your sandals, your panties and going potty). You always end all of your prayers with saying "and for ALL my friends!"

- I love how proud you are of yourself for going potty these days! We continue to do the "poopy" dance around here when you do that and you always say, "Mommy, you so happy??"

- Your independence is funny but yet trying at times. It's great to see you explore new things and want to try them yourself! You like to open all doors by yourself, go potty, put on shoes, pick out shoes to wear and many other things all by yourself!

- You love your babies! You are very nurturing, which we have known for quite some time. You love to give hugs to your babies, tell them to "shh!" quietly because they are "crying", change their diapers, fix them food, etc. It's so sweet to watch. You recently named your babies "Sally Sue". The names change frequently!

- You are so loving. You love to give hugs and "sugar" and it makes me so happy! You won't let us leave you without a billion sugars and you will say "Hug me bye!"

- You still are a bit unsure of new situations. You want us to hold you a lot when you are in a new environment until you have figured out the situation!

- As one of your teachers told me, you are not what we should call a "tattle tell", but you love to tell a play by play of everything that's going on. You will tell me "Daddy's going outside!!" or "Maggie's barking!!" It cracks me up!

We love you, sweet girl! I cannot believe that you are already 2 1/2. Time flies when you are having fun! You are so precious :)

Party Animal

Josie's social calendar was very full on Saturday! We attended two birthday parties!

Of course, I forgot my camera at the first party. Aimee had a princess themed party with lots of fun outside play time! Josie surprised us all by being the first child to go for the big water slide. I'm not sure when she became a dare devil, but I was glad to see it! Aimee's mom did an AMAZING castle cake to go along with the princess theme. I wish I had a picture to share!!!

The second party was for Josie's sweet friend, Aubrey. The theme of this one was Minnie Mouse. Aubrey's mom had made the most adorable pink cupcakes with oreos as Minnie's ears!

This was also an outdoor party with a huge water slide that Josie just LOVED!!!

Aimee -- the birthday girl from party#1

Josie and her friends eating cupcakes and snacks

(No, that's not Josie's diet coke!)

Miss Chardae (one of Josie's teachers) and Josie

Josie & Aubrey (birthday girl #2) in Aubrey's new mustang :)

We had a GREAT time celebrating with these two sweet girls!

Fourth of July Weekend 2011

What a weekend! We had a busy, busy weekend! We had such a great time enjoying our long weekend. Josh and I soooooo enjoyed that we could have a day or two to do some fun things and enjoy good times as a family!

Josie and I went to some friends' house on Saturday morning to swim and play!

Then, we went to the river with some good friends on Sunday!
Josie --- a future river rat! ha!

My big girl!

We stayed at the river to cookout on Sunday night and then watched fireworks on the river after dark. Josie absolutely had a BLAST! She wasn't a bit scared of the fireworks and kept yelling, "Pow!" "Do again!!" ha! She's so silly! We came home very late on Sunday night so that we could get ready for a neighborhood parade in Brownsville the next morning.

Josie & Aubrey riding in style :)

Josie and Daddy

Josie & Mommy saying the Pledge of Allegiance

We had a small family cookout at our house on the 4th of July. I think Josie really loved being center of attention ;)

Josie is so proud of her flag that she made at school!




We ended the Fourth of July with a few more fireworks at home!

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!

God Bless the USA!

Woo Hoo!! Mission Accomplished!

We are VERY proud to say that our favorite little girl is officially.....

POTTY TRAINED!!!!!!!!!!!

Praise God! Alleluia!

I would say that she's really been accident free for a couple of weeks, but I was so scared to jinx us that I didn't breathe a word :) ha!

After lots of cookies, candy, stickers, "poopy dances", purchases of big girl panties AND tears......

we can consider this MISSION ACCOMPLISHED :)

Funny side note: Obviously I told Josie how happy I was each time she would potty over the past few months, beecause now she will potty and look at me and say, "Mommy, you happy!?!?"

My sweet girl! We are sooooooo proud of her :)

Daycare Parade

A friend of mine sent me this cute picture of Josie and some of her classmates from Friday. They had a little "musical parade" down the halls of the daycare.

They are making fun memories!

What We've Been Up to & Josie-isms

Our sweet little girl was sick for a little over a week. Poor thing was pitiful! She had a fever off and on for the first few days and her eyes were puffy, had a runny nose and was so sleepy. The doctor said it was just allergies and had to run its course with a little help from some medicine. We missed the last 2 days of swim lessons, because Josie was sick :(

We have been busy the past few weeks. We went with my in-laws to eat at Andrew Michael Italian Kitchen in Memphis to celebrate our birthdays. It was WONDERFUL! We had such a great time.

Josh and I also took Josie last weekend to Lambuth Day to say farewell to our alma mater. The day went a little differently than expected due to rain. However, we enjoyed seeing some great friends and catching up. I wish we could have stayed longer, but it was still a fun time! I didn't get a single pic that day, because it was so hectic, but we hope to take Josie back soon to get some pictures on the LU campus. We are so sad to see the university close. We made many friends and great memories at that special place!

Josie is ALL better now!

Our sweet girl LOVES to be outside. We haven't used her new swimming pool in a couple of weeks since she's been under the weather. Now that she's better, she enjoys watering the flowers and has discovered that a water fight is fun, too! If Josh had been here the other night, I would have gotten him to take my picture after my child totally attacked me with the hose! It was pretty funny!

I think Josie has changed so much recently. Josh and I laugh and say that she will say ANYTHING! She asks all kinds of questions.... "What's that called?", "Where did (fill in the blank) go?", etc. She talks about everything and is very observant. She will say the craziest things! Her new favorite line is, "My tummy hurting!" We are still trying to decide what she means by this. I think sometimes she says that when she is hungry and even when she wants attention. She tells us this at least 10 times a day. She makes us laugh every single day. She also is going through the "terrible two's"... major temper tantrums and fits. I need to get it on video asap :) We are really working on this! A couple of times she has thrown a major fit, she will look at me and say, "Happy Mother's Day, Mommy" -- I guess that's supposed to make it all better :) I try not to laugh! Also, Josh told her the other day not to do something and she came running to me saying, "Daddy told me no! Go get him!" ha! She's a sensitive little gal. She is constantly telling us that we hurt her feelings or that we are bothering her. Obviously they are learning to express emotions and different feelings at school!

We are still working on potty training! She's doing really well with it. Josie's in "big girl panties" all of the time now except for nap and bedtime. Knock on wood, NO TEE TEE ACCIDENTS lately! We are still working on the other kind, but she did do it in the potty this weekend and we did a "poopy dance!!!" She picked out a new toy, too. We are hoping this will be more consistent soon. Josie's VERY proud of going to the potty and will completely go on her own now and then tell us. Then, she will say, "cookie for potty??" or "candy for potty?!" Smart girl :)

Our sweet girl loves to say the blessing at meal time. She says, "Thank you God for our food. Amen." This is her blessing from school. Such a sweetheart :) Makes my heart happy!

Josie says her prayers every night at bedtime, as well. She tickles me with the funny things that she prays for and she never forgets her friends and family.

Josie is still a bit of a picky eater. She still will not eat much fruit except for bananas and apples. Absolutely NO strawberries. She loves cheese, yogurt, cheetos, blueberry muffins, green beans, peanut butter, granola bars, pancakes, turkey and chicken. I'm trying to introduce her to new things often. I do not want her to be a picky eater for life!


Josie's imagination has started going wild! She seems to pretend and role play more lately. She plays with her babies and will hug and kiss them and tell them to stop crying. She will pretend to read books to me and her dolls. She loves to go grocery shopping in the house and then come to me so that we can ring it up on her cash register. I love seeing her personality come out!

My Handy Husband ;)

I am a "sucker" for the Extreme Makeover show or ANY magical home transformation with some good before and after pics....

Well............

I wish I could say that I had really great dramatic before and after pics for you, but that's UNFORTUNATELY not the case here. My very handy husband recently decided to tackle lots of "to do's" on his Honey Do list :) Well, these are actually projects that we have wanted to check off our list for YEARS. With our crazy lifestyle, these projects were put on hold for too long. Josh told me a few weeks ago that he was going to shock me and actually get to work on the list! Ha! Before I knew it, he had started painting our living room the color that we picked out months ago. I walked in one night and he had started the transformation. The awful red room is now a pretty golden color that I LOVE! See the last two pics! All of these changes have happened so quickly and I cannot believe that I don't have good pictures to show the dramatic changes!

This first picture is of the new WHITE trim in Josh's office. Look VERY closely... You can see the side of the window is a fresh coat of white paint and the top is still the cream color that the trim in our house has been since we moved in. Looks much better, huh!?!? Humor me :)

Below is Josh's office.
This is the mess that we are currently living in, but it will be so worth it!

Josh has been fixing the wall below the big window in his office. Rain has damaged the wall and it looked awful. I soooo wish that I had a before pic of this one... the large hole in the wall was terrible! As you can see, that is our back door (off of our carport) and this room is seen by everyone who comes over. The hole in the wall was a major eye sore!

This is the fabulous living room that was once red. Imagine this room BRIGHT RED.... yea, see... you can appreciate the new look, right?!!? We still need to get pictures hung back up and do some more decorating, but I'm enjoying this room so much! It's our formal living room and gets very little use, but it now feels cozy! I would love to get some pretty window treatments next!We have also replaced the white fan in our kitchen to a nice new light fixture (and even better than the new appearance is that the light bulbs don't blow out every few days like the crazy fan did!)

I'm so thankful to have a handy husband who can tackle these projects. I think Josh is feeling the pressure to get as much done as possible before he starts school in two months! He's on a roll!