Livin' for the weekend.

Our weekend was busy and because it was so busy it was gone before I had time to look up.  Mr. Craft was filming at home yesterday so the lil ladies and I headed out for a girl's day.  We ended up with some pretty nice finds at the thrift store (pictures later) and the Monster got to spend her hard-earned birthday money around town.  She was so excited to buy things herself and spent most of the time walking around the stores adding up prices out loud and counting out her money, "to have it ready" she said..  So proud of her when she paid for her stuff (I helped a little) and said, "thank you" to the cashier when she gave her back change.  So grown up!

We had lots of fun and I love spending one-on-one time with them like this.  We ended with super fast back-to-work/school prep and bath time.  The Monster is doing the shower thing on her own now.  Geez, she needs to stop growing!  Good thing Bear is still down for a bubble bath.

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Zooin' it up!

On Friday we decided to take our little monster (and bear too, of course) on a surprise trip to the zoo.  After we picked the girls up from their mom on Saturday we had a birthday dinner with their nanny and papaw where they gave her some surprise gifts.  I think the gifts were somewhat overshadowed by the awesome birthday song that the servers sang to her - she talked about it all weekend.  They let me bring out the big slice of cake to give to her so that made it a little extra special for me.  She was all red cheeks and smiles as she leaned against her daddy.  "I love this day," I remember her saying.  And little sister later declaring in the restroom, "I love your birthday, Cloey."

After dinner we left for Knoxville and the girls kept asking over the next couple of hours how much longer it would be until we got home.  They had no idea - they just knew that they had been in the car seemingly longer than usual.  Cloey finally figured it out when we pulled up in front of our hotel.  This was her second surprise - child had dreamed of staying in a hotel.

The zoo, the third surprise, was a hit all around.  

The bear in front of the bear cave.  Of course!

 

Pure determination.

Pit stop.

Who forgot her makeup at home?  This lady.  It would have probably melted off anyway.

Emma kept talking about seeing the "ungrellas" and once we finally did she told me that she was scared.  I think it was the fact that they were so big and human-looking.  Oh, and this was MY first trip to the zoo along with the girls!

We ended up adding a day and turning our little excursion into a mini-vacation.  We kept it simple and just swam, ate, and lounged around the hotel.  Much needed time away.  Birthday girl even made sure she got sang to one more time at dinner by constantly reminding our waitress that she was turning seven.  

Bear made sure to keep the Bible close by in the hotel.  "It has the plans in it," she said.
She also said the same thing about the phone book.

How was your 3-day weekend?

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Smell that?

 

The smell of fresh paint is lingering in our home and I. like. it.  We've been busy the last few weeks prepping and painting the girls' separate rooms.  That is exactly how they each refer to them too.  MY separate room.  This is the first time that they'll have rooms to call their very own and this is the first major revamp that we've done in our new home so far - it's very exciting all around.

Emma's (aka the bear) room is done as far as painting and stenciling.  Cloey's (aka the monster) is still in progress and will be finished this coming weekend.  Just in time for her birthday!  I first met her when she was Emma's age (4) and on Monday our sassy little redhead will be turning 7.  It seems unreal.  I smile when I think about how I've been blessed to become part of their lives and watch them grow.  There is nothing like motherhood (stepmotherhood is still motherhood in my book).

The last few days have been very busy as are most days around here.  I managed to squeeze in a couple of projects that I've been itching to do for the girls' rooms.

In the meantime our ladies have been busy soaking up what little bit of summer they have left.  We love it when we see them enjoying being outdoors.  Especially when I look out the kitchen window and see that little sister has volunteered to have herself and her kittens locked in a dog crate.  Big sister was happy to oblige.

Emma took her role very seriously and was quite the diva pet.  She had Cloey run inside multiple times to collect kitty food, water, and fabric to drape over the top of the crate to make it look pretty.  They make me giddy inside.

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Beginning.

Well, this is my very first blog post in a long while and I am feeling the pressure.  I remember years ago when I first learned about blogging on what you would then refer to as your "personal site."  A place you would spend hours creating using a crazy amount of learn-as-you-go html (what, what Lissa Explains it All!) only to be sick of looking at it by the time it was done.  I remember the pain of frames quite well.  

Now instead of guestbooks we have comments and Instagram has replaced those popular webcam images overlayed with date/time stamps.  Things have definitely changed since then and so have I.  We've come a long way, baby!

I'm not going to lie - this makes me nervous.  A lot of times (okay, pretty much all of the time) with social anxiety you have to push yourself to do something you're not comfortable with.  Blessedly, I have an amazingly supportive husband who will not only listen to all of my wild ideas but push me into bringing them to fruition when he knows it's something I really want to do.

I hope to use this blog to document our busy lives and to help keep track of memories.  I hope to meet lots of similar and different people.  To learn more about myself.  To educate others about social anxiety disorder  and to show that it is possible to have a life with such a horrendous disorder.

Let the adventure begin!

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