Halloween

If Hannah Montana had a baby pumpkin, a pet dinosaur, and hired Batman for a bodyguard this would be their gathering....

Can we get any more original at our house? I have a feeling there were 1,000,000 Hannah Montana/Batman combos this Halloween! FYI, Collin doesn't naturally have a smooshed face, that's the result of wrestling on a tight dinosaur hat.

You know your a mom of 4 when...

the best picture you have with your baby is one where you haven't showered in days, there is an unmade bed in the background, and butt cream is smeared on your forehead. Daniel's baby book might be a little lighter than the other kids. Well, that's assuming I finish everyones one day!

Kids!

A couple of videos from the hospital...

Visiting with baby Daniel in the hospital...I was trying to talk, my voice sounds awful. He gave me a sweet smile though.



On my way home from the hospital, Collin hadn't seen me in 5 days, so all he kept saying was, "Mommy's here"... I got mixed up when I turned the camera on Mason (still on lots of painkillers!) so half of it is upside down :)

The Fourth and Final....Baby Daniel's arrival

One day shy of 37 weeks pregnant, I finally had the surprise labor that I had been wanting with our past three children. Of course, be careful what you wish for! After Daniel went into distress and other problems, I had to have a c section. Baby Daniel Knox was born 10/14/2009 at 1:18 am weighing in at 5 lbs 15 oz and was 19 inches long. I don't actually remember this picture being taken, he and I were quite out of it at the time! Luckily, he was able to fight off an infection with antibiotics, and was released from the NICU after only 6 days. I'm still recovering from the not so fun c section after I got an infection too. So our life with four kids is progressing well now, and hopefully will be back to our maximum chaos in no time. I'll try to post all the other happenings around here soon.

Very Indecisive

After much deliberation, we picked a house color! Good thing because it was getting embarrassing having anyone over to our house. Hopefully we'll have some after pics soon. We went with the bottom row to the right if you're interested.

Whew...She Finally Lost a Tooth!

"MOMMY, I LOST MY FIRST TOOTH!!!" was the first thing I heard this morning as Elise busted into my room to wake me up. Thank goodness! She has been wiggling and wiggling and listening to all of her friends talk about all the money the tooth fairy has been bringing them for weeks. Too bad Elise's tooth fairy forgot to go to the bank! I'm thinking some half dollars Bryan and I have stashed away might be cooler anyway (I hope).

School was out today too due to Atlanta's flooding so we had just enough time to make a quick tooth fairy pillow! (BTW, Kaity, I think this was your fabric?? There is a lot more I can send you)

Need a closer view???

Big Kid's Night Out

Now that we have a wonderful sitter, we decided to take Mason and Elise out on the town. We saw Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs in 3d, which was adorable. Mason is still a little on the young side to sit through a movie though. If it weren't for Mommy's many potty breaks, popcorn, soda, candy and the 3d glasses he would not have made it!

Then we went out for meatballs. Italian food and buttered popcorn was a really nice treat for the family (minus Collin)...we have been very dairy deprived since we've learned of Collin's milk allergy!

The Lost Dog

We were eating breakfast this morning getting ready to leave for church when we realized Ziti was not doing her usual job of cleaning up Collin's mess on the floor (she is always under his chair when he eats). We then remembered that she had been outside and saw that the front gate to our yard was open. Whoops.

So Bryan ran outside to check her usual runaway spots, and she was nowhere to be found. We spent the next 3 hours searching the neighborhood, asking neighbors, driving the streets, making lost dog fliers, and calling animal shelters. For some reason Bryan decided to inspect the backside of our fence in case she had tried to get back in from one of our neighbors' yards. He began calling her name and heard a faint whimper....and this is what he found:

Our genius of a dog had evidently gotten out and tried getting back in the backyard via the front porch. Somehow she creeped around the ledge and then realized she was stuck. Poor Ziti was so scared Bryan had to peel her claws off of the ledge.

Christmas Stocking Tutorial

Our family was complete after we had Mason (haha) so I ordered the cutest embroidered stockings from Ballard Designs. Much to our surprise our family was NOT finished and Ballard Designs discontinued my stockings leaving me now 2 short.

So this go around I'm making my own, and I finally found some cute clearance fabric and an adorable tutorial online! I was so excited I had to share the link for my one reader who can sew :) Elf Christmas Stockings

If you want a good view of the lions at the zoo...

use you kids as bait against the glass. I loved watching our kids' reactions to the lion jumping up, roaring and scratching the glass: Elise screamed and froze, Collin laughed in ignorance, and Mason was no where to be found.

Our Littlest Guy

We got a little better view of the baby today with the 4-d ultrasound. His face is currently smashed against the uterine wall so it isn't a full picture, but close enough. My Dr. estimates him to be around 4.5lbs right now (I'm hopeful he is overestimating that one).

Mason's 1st Day of 3yo Preschool

First Day of First Grade!

Elise is loving 1st Grade! Its amazing how much she has changed since she started Kindergarten! I had planned on driving her the first day of school (I was hoping to get a lot of pictures), and Elise would have none of that, so off on the bus she went!

Our Big (little) Vacation

All of our high hopes for a family vacation this year turned into a 5 day get away to see my parents and with a short side trip to Chattanooga. Our kids actually had a blast and luckily had no idea that it wasn't a big vacation.
We stayed at the Chattanooga Choo Choo inside a real retired train car. Overall the Choo Choo is getting a little rundown, but how could you pass up staying in a train with kids? While we were in Chattanooga we also visited Rock City and The Discovery Museum, both of which were so much fun! Our last sightseeing was to Mayfield Dairies to see inside a real dairy and how ice cream was made...we sampled of course too.

All Aboard!

The entrance of Rock City. Check out Elise's hot shades: Bryan and the kids on the swinging bridge:
Elise checking the views:
They loved the cheesy Fairyland at the end:

At the Creative Discovery Museum:

Collin loved Curious George!The Mayfield Dairy tour

Bry watched the Mets (lose); I watched the sunset

This is from their July series....hopefully the Met's will have better luck come September against the Braves. The sky was pretty, the game was not!

Papa's Boat

During our little getaway to TN the kids got to go out on Mimi and Papa's boat. Elise hadn't been out on it since she was 2 and it was Mason and Collin's 1st time. Mason and Elise loved the big boat.
After we were home for a few days, Mason brought up Santa Claus and I asked him what he wanted for Christmas. He told me he wanted a big Papa boat....it might be the first year we can't deliver on a wish!

Elise driving the boat with Papa:

Trying to keep Collin happy despite being restrained with his life jacket:

Raisin Boy

That was a fun diaper to change! Little naughty boy gets to start using the play pen timeout now!

Bring it, Beckham

Ok so maybe Beckham is better, but in my opinion Mason is way cuter! Mason loves soccer (so far). He completely wore himself out with his first class yesterday, so much so that he finally broke down and napped for me :).