Two Posts in One Day

So I am going the extra yard and doing two posts in one day to get myself up to date! Enjoy! We met, hugged, and set on the Easter Bunny's lap. Sawyer said he liked Santa better because this Easter Bunny didn't talk!

Ice cream after the Easter Bunny sitting!! Daddy's idea...I know I married him for a reason!

Matt's stepbrother and his wife were in town over Easter weekend. Eliot is their daughter. Parker and her get along so well, we wish they lived closer!! Parker and Sawyer had a wonderful time playing with their cousin all weekend!!

A picture from the "Easter Egg Hunt" on Poppy and Cha Cha's patio. The egg hunt lasted about 2 minutes. It was all fun and games until all three realized there were 16 eggs. 3 kids, 16 eggs...you do the math!!

And finally. I couldn't get a good picture of Sawyer's wound. He is the proud owner of 7 staples to his head. He and a door casing collided and the door won. He has been a super brave boy over the entire thing. Honestly, Parker and I were more upset then he was. He is rather proud of his staples..he thinks they are "awesome'!!

Make a Smilebox greeting

UPDATE!!

For all of you who had thought about sending out a search party or contacting the authorities, worry no longer. The Daniel Family is alive, just horrible at keeping up with the blog!! It seemed really overwhelming to sit down and update the last 3 months, but sadly nothing was worth updating until the end of March....that brings me to Sawyer's 3rd birthday!! We celebrated his birthday at Pump It Up per his request. Basically there were a whole bunch of 3 year olds (plus a few older ones) running around jumping, bouncing, and working off every bit of energy we could make them!!

This was Sawyer's birthday cake. We ordered in almost a month ahead of time because apparently no other child in Williamson County wants an Incredible Hulk cake. It was a "special order"....interesting choice!!

Blowing out the candles...thanks Helen Marie for being the photographer!!

Just a real cute picture the morning of his birthday!! Such a sweet boy..yes, he is a rock star!

Daddy and David enjoying the festivities. Don't they look super excited!!

When the Circus comes to town

For Parker's 5th birthday, we decided to spend the evening at the circus. A great time was had by all and Parker truly felt like the entire show was put on just for him. I hope he remembers this birthday and always believes this was just for him!!Parker wore a button the said "I am 5 today". While in line he made sure EVERYONE knew it was his birthday.

We got there a little early and went down onto the floor to see a sneak peak of the acts. These guys were jumping rope and doing a lot of cool flips. This guy picked Parker out of the crowd to come jump rope with him. Parker made instant friends with him and told me the guy picked him because he liked his button. Parker also said he liked the guy's hair (look closely, it is all braids....GREAT!!)

Of course Parker found a pretty lady and just had to have his picture made with her!

One of the coolest parts of the show. These tigers were huge. As you can tell, we had very good seats..it made me a little nervous!! How does that guy turn his back to them??!!

The elephants were pretty cool too!! These guys were HUGE and Sawyer begged us to ride one....oh well, maybe next time!!

Parker

I regret that I was not able to post this yesterday, but this post is dedicated to Parker on his 5th birthday!!


Parker,
Five years ago you changed my life completely. I loved you from the moment I saw you and ever since you have done nothing but bring constant joy to my life. I have cherished these past five years and feel so blessed to be able to call you my son. You are my first born and you will always hold a special place in my heart. You are a wonderful big brother to Sawyer and a true friend to everyone around.
This picture was taken right after you were born. Looking back, it is so characteristic of you to be so alert and aware of your surroundings!! I can not believe that you are already 5. Although those years seem to have gone by so fast, I can honestly say that my life doesn't feel like it started until you were born. I have learned so much about myself and life through your eyes and I can only hope that you will one day say the same. I love you dearly Parker Daniel...Happy 5th Birthday Buddy!!!

Christmas Cheer

Christmas has come and gone and the Daniel Family had a GREAT one!! Playing the part of Santa and encouraging my children's imagination was so much fun and proved to be one the best Christmas' I have ever experienced. We are surrounded by so many people that we love and are fortunate enough to share our lives with ALL of our parents. My children have very involved grandparents, which I hope will provide them with so many fond memories for years to come. I hope everyone had a wonderful Holiday Season. Here are a few pictures from ours... Making cookies for Santa. We started this last year on Christmas Eve. We make them from scratch and decorate them. My OCD has to take the back seat so that the boys can cut out and decorate them the way they want to....It is so much fun.

The Santa bag that ChaCha and Poppy bring filled with gifts for all! The boys got in the bag for their picture to be taken....I think this would have made a great Christmas Card!!!

The Ford Family Christmas took a change and was held at my uncle's house this year. Granny got to relax and enjoy her family instead of working in the kitchen. Our family is constantly growing.....it seems there is a new one every year. Congrats to Jennifer and Johnny on their little boy due this spring!!!

And to all a good night.....Sawyer was tuckered out after a full week of Christmas. He missed the openning of presents with Papa D and Jane. Parker opened his gifts for him....poor little guy!!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Pictures to come...

With the season upon us, I have not been a good blogger...sorry! I will, however, post a plenitude of pictures of the holiday season once they are over!



For now, Darci tagged me to answer a few questions, so here I go...



8 things I have done today...

1.) Got the boys up and dressed and off to school

2.) Vacuumed and moped all floors in preparation for a showing

3.) Drove to the boys school in my PJs to give them their animals they forgot

4.) Had a cup of coffee or two

5.) Checked my emails and managed to pay a few bills

6.) Took a shower

7.) Folded and put away 4 loads of laundry

8.) Gathered all the dog paraphernalia and the dog, so that our house could be shown

( 1-8 done by 10:30am)



8 things I watch

1.) Max and Ruby ( I hear you Trish!!)

2.) Go Diego Go

3.) Lazy Town ( Trish, apparently our kids watch the same thing!)

4.) Grey's Anatomy

5.)Lost (it is in between seasons...boo!)

6. ) Any Law and Order (reruns of course, because who has time to watch it on prime time)

7.) Any CSI ( again reruns, for the same reason as listed above)

8.) Sadly, I can't name anything else



8 things I wish for

1.) For my children to grow up and truly know how much I dearly love them

2.) For my husband to know the same

3.) Health and happiness for all of our friends and family (cliche, but so very true)

4.) The appetite to know God the way Parker wants to

5.) For 2009 to bring happy memories and help erase some of the bad ones brought by 2008

6.) Our house to sell

7.) I like Darci's wish for a cleaning fairy...it is a wish

8.) The financial ability for Matt to pursue his visions and dreams...



8 things I look forward to

1.) Christmas morning!!

2.) My children running into our room for morning hugs and kisses

3.) Parker telling me all about his day..he is so passionate about everything he does

4.) My morning coffee

5.) A simpler life

6.) Our next vacation...GOD willing

7.) Spending time with my girl friends
8.) Watching my children become amazing people.....

A Christmas Lesson

I had an interesting conversation with Parker yesterday that I wanted to share. I adopted an child from the Angel Tree the same age as Parker with the same interests. The idea was to help Parker understand the meaning of Christmas through giving to an underprivileged child. I began by explaining to Parker why we were buying for this little boy. I decided to explain things as simple as possible and started by explaining that this little boy's parents did not have jobs. I went on to say that Santa would bring one gift to him, but that would probably be all he got. He was signed up for this program in hopes that someone, such as us, who had a little to give, would buy him something special for Christmas morning. I went through all the people that buy for Parker at Christmas and told him that this little boy didn't have all those people, so WE were going to get him something special to help make his Christmas morning special. Here is the dialog that took place after the explanation:

ME: This little boy likes Spiderman and Iron Man just like you. What would you like to get for him?

PARKER: quite and obviously deep in thought. (This was it, I just knew he was going to say something sweet such as "We can give him some of my presents...) "Mom, I wish you didn't have a job so that other people could buy me presents"

Great!!! Lesson learned...for me!!

Baby Miller and a Christmas Tree

The past couple of weeks have been pretty calm around our household. Sawyer is successfully potty trained and we got to welcome our new friend Miller Jayne Campbell into the world. We went to visit Mommy and baby last Tuesday. The boys had a great time playing with all of baby Miller's brother's toys (he wasn't there) and they finally got to "hold" her before we left. They were so proud...I think they have some distortion of who she actually belongs too...Sorry Trish!

We have a small tree that we put in the boys' room so that they can decorate and touch THAT tree and not Mommy's..it has worked so far! The boys helped me put up the tree and decorate it with some old and new ornaments.

Parker did the high up ornaments and Sawyer did the ones toward the bottom...the tree looks, well.....interesting!

Cheesing for the camera as usual

The finished product. There are actually colored lights on there, but they think they are magic because they are on a timer that come on at 5pm. That is my way of not allowing them to see where it is plugged in!!

Well...Christmas is underway!!

A Prayer to the Potty Training Gods...

For those of you who have potty trained little boys, you understand the need for a silent prayer as you start the day. Sawyer has been telling us that he doesn't NEED diapers any more.."I BIG!" he says...so today (with excitement and apprehension) we have taken to potty training. We went to Target and bought our favorite underwear and discussed that Thomas would not like to be peed on, so hopefully this will go well.... Sawyer paraded around our room this morning so everyone could see his big boy pants! We went out to breakfast (I don't know why) and he made sure any one in ear shot knew he had Thomas underwear on....even showing a nice, understanding gentleman to our right...

So big...kind of sad!!!

TITANS....7-0!!

We got to go to the Titans game Monday night with our dear friends, the Johnson's. Helen Marie and I were into the game MUCH more than Matt and David were. It was cold, but we stayed on our feet the entire game and kept warm by cheering on our TITANS!

Hank sang the National Anthem in true Nashville and Monday Night Football Fashion!

Intoducing the Titans...so much fun!!

Scoring in our end zone!

The boys stayed with a babysitter and the Johnson's. This is how we found them when we picked them up. The were tuckered out!

A Fun Packed Weekend

Our plans for this weekend were quit ambitious. The boys spent the better part of last week at Honey and Big Daddy's and got home late Friday night. They had a great time, but were very tired from their fun packed week. We had A LOT planned for Saturday so we were wondering how well everything would go. We started off by meeting Papa and Donna in Nashville for breakfast. After an impressive amount of pancakes we were off to Pumpkin Festival in Franklin. We look forward to this every year. The boys had a GREAT time!!

Sawyer was so excited to meet Tigger. He followed him around until he got a picture with him. He was so sweet asking if he could take his picture! We spent 3 1/2 hours jumping on inflatables, playing games, and walking around. The boys were so good that when they asked to do the Bungee Jump, we could only say yes.
Parker had a great time and got to go REALLY high. He loved it, of course, and would have stayed on it for hours if they had allowed.

Sawyer wanted to do it too, like big brother, but you could only imagine how nervous I was once they harnessed him in....look how small he looks. I was sure he would just fly out of that thing. The guy operating the bungee asked me if he could go higher after Sawyer was practically begging him to "FLY HIGHER, FLY HIGHER".

Once I saw this picture I understood the reason behind all the GASPING and OMGs! He went higher than anyone else on that thing.....he just giggled the whole time. We may have a problem on our hands.

After Fall Festival, we went to Parker's last soccer game of the season. He had a great game. After the game we went to the end of the season party. At this point, no one has had a nap and all we have had to eat is about 5 lbs of pancakes. The glucose was quickly brought up by an impressively large cupcake with black icing (yes that is black icing on Parker's mouth...he basically inhaled the thing). He got a trophy as they always do at the end of the season, to which he asked for another one because "he already had two the these at home". The party was fun and with another season of soccer behind us, we pushed the envelope with the boys and went to the Barker's for their annual Tennessee/Alabama party. The boys spent about 2 hours in the fenced in back yard with 5 beagle puppies that a neighbor had allowed to come over. Thank God for small miracles....The boys didn't even fuss until around 7pm when I took them home for a much needed early night to bed...for them and ME!

Soccer Time

Fall Soccer is almost over and I haven't even taken any pictures, so I thought I would post some pics from yesterday's game. Parker is #3 on the black team. This is his third sesson playing soccer (which seems odd to say since he is only 4 1/2.) Anyway, he continues to like soccer so we continue to play. Parker is one of the main kids that score on his team. Notice all the green players around him...he still scored. After scoring, Parker raises his arms above his head and jumps around for a few seconds so that everyone knows that he scored...he actually does this even if he didn't score!
Better action shot.
Sawyer has wanted to play since the first season, so his time is occupied by snacks. This is what is left of the popcorn ball he devoured in the first quarter!
Parker's favorite part of the game is the tunnel after the game. I truly think he believes all the parent's do this JUST for him. He usually has to go through two or three times, with Sawyer right behind him. They are so stinkin' cute!

Fun at Fall Fest

We spent last Friday night at our school's annual Fall Fest. This was the first year since we started to Southgate that I was not involved in the planning and operations of Fall Fest. I had such a good time playing with the boys and watching them enjoy themselves, rather than making sure everyone was where they were supposed to be. The boys wore their Halloween costumes and ate a ton of junk, so they were all smiles from the beginning to end. Most of Parker's classmates went to Kindergarten this past August, so he was extremely excited to see Brandon (see Iron Man) at Fall Fest. They caught up (took 1 minute) and played the entire night, with Sawyer right there with them. Sawyer's costume sustained two ketchup stains and several blood drops from a collision in the JUMPY CASTLE, so now he says he is a "scary X-man."

A Shower for My Girls.......

I had a shower at my house for some good friends at work yesterday

They are all having girls and their due dates are getting close, so we got

together and celebrated!!Sarah, Martha, and Trish...the guests of honor.
Doesn't everyone look like they are having fun!
Trish modeling her new Sit-N-Stand stroller. Perfect for baby Miller and big brother Lincoln.
The cute blankets and hair bows that Kelly "Bradley" made for the girls...she is so talented!..who knew :)

Sarah and her new pack and play for baby Isabelle.

Hope you girls had a great time....I love you all!