Emma's version of the Nativity

Mack and the slide

Mack has a new trick. The Slide. He figured out how to climb up our playset and slide down this past Saturday. He LOVES it. This video was after several times up and down. He was moving a little slower by the time Worth and I had stopped laughing at him and decided to video. He had dirt all over his face from landing on it many times. Ellie and Emma had no interest in him until I started videoing. So, excuse Ellie trying to get all up in the camera. She's the performer of the family and doesn't want to miss any chances at being in the spotlight!

Mack's 15 month checkup

Mack had his 15 month check up yesterday. So here are his stats:

Weight: 21lb 3 oz.  7th percentile
Height: 30in. 13th percentile
Head circumference: 18.25in 23rd percentile

We actually saw the pediatrician during this visit, and she  agrees that he is small, but she is not worried about him at all. She even commented: "he's fine!" And Mack looked at her and said "I'm fine!" We both cracked up! After playing 'you can't catch me' around the room with Dr. Blache, her next comment was "Boy! You have yourself a little sport!" No kidding! It's pretty bad when your child makes the pediatrician sweat! Of course, Mack thought he was the most hilarious person.

He didn't even cry when he got his shots. I was surprised, and so was the nurse. He was so brave! Other than his weight, he checked out ahead of the game on everything else. I think he's going to be an early talker like Ellie, because this kid doesn't stop talking! Words he says regularly: Hey, no, thank you, love you, night night, outside (which was his first word, kid LOVES being outside!) mama, da (for daddy,) ball, shoes, car, paci, and apparently, "I'm fine." 

He's a busy, busy boy that is a magnet for anything dangerous. He can have 10 safe, fun toys in front of him, and he will turn for the electric outlet or the scissors that were left out. Ahhhh! Getting back into the throws of toddlerhood! Nothing like the joys of parenting. The hard part this go round is having a 3 year old and a 6 year old (with an endless supply of energy) to keep up with as well! Mack has definitely been a game changer! He's so loving when he wants to be and loves hugs and blowing kisses. I don't know what we did before this sweet little monster came into our family!

"Ugh! Another picture?"

I have to take pictures of him in these cute little outfits! I know it won't be long before he will be too grown up to wear them! I could just eat him up! 

Hard to get him still and facing the camera! This was after church a couple of weeks ago and he was over it and ready for lunch. 

Visit with Santa

We had our annual neighborhood visit with Santa this weekend. The kids did great! Mack didn't even shed 1 tear. I was so looking forward to a picture of him screaming his head off in Santa's lap, but oh well, maybe next year?!

I think Ellie was a little scared of Santa. I had to remind her to tell Santa what she wanted. Emma, on the other hand, old pro that she is, walked right up and began spouting out her wishes as soon as we got into the room. The girls both asked for American Girl Dolls. We'll see about that. I'm blaming their obsession with these outrageously expensive dolls on some play dates we've had recently!

We had doughnuts and fruit and enjoyed hanging out with some neighbors and their kids. It's definitely an easy Santa visit with no line, no waiting and free food. You can't beat that!  These are a few of the pictures we took yesterday morning.

First attempt at a picture with Santa

Mack is just hanging out, sucking his fingers. Not upset that a man with a big beard is holding him at all. 

Mack finally turns around like "Wait, who is this?" But, it doesn't ruffle his feathers. 

We tried to get a picture of all 3 in front of Santa's tree, but as you see it was not a success. 

Trying to escape

Mack is DONE!

One of our neighbors volunteered to try and get a family shot of all 5 of us. This is the best one he got. Worth looks hilarious in this picture to me! Clearly Worth and I were not as festively dressed as our children.  

Thanksgiving Weekend

Thanksgiving week is usually always crazy for me, because it sneaks up on me every year. I am never prepared for school to be out, I don't have babysitters lined up for the week, I forget to get the Thanksgiving groceries a week ahead of time and I'm fighting  the crowd in Publix on Tuesday or Wednesday before Thanksgiving. But, this year, I did pretty good. I actually lined my babysitter up 1 week in advance. I got the groceries in time and had all my food made in advance. I was pretty impressed with myself especially since I've had a child (Emma) with flu a and flu b and strep throat for the last 3 weeks, and another child (Mack) with a double ear infection with ruptured ear drum. And yes, Emma did have a flu shot.

Despite all of the sickness and 3 children clawing the walls to get outside and play, but being unable to because of the torrential rain at the beginning of the week,  it was actually a fairly relaxing holiday.
Thanksgiving day, my parents, my brother, and his wife came to our house. Worth was on heart call so we had to host at our house. Worth's parents were up in Athens with his sister who is about to bust with my 2nd nephew- so she couldn't travel. Just like every other year,  we ate way too much and still had way too many leftovers.

Friday morning, we got up early and went to get our Christmas tree at Hambrick's Christmas Tree Farm in Hahira. This is a family tradition that rain, sleet, snow, shine, heart call or regular call, we perform! I love how my husband insists on doing this no matter what every year. I hope our kids stay enthusiastic about it even when they become whiny teenagers.

We spent most of Friday and part of Saturday putting up decorations. Our outside decorations are still a work in progress by Worth, AKA Clark Griswold. (There have been some technical difficulties due to light putting up technique - but so far, no major Bowers baby fits about it) So, I will have to post those pictures later when he gets it all done!

Part of the spread: corn casserole, Mac -n-cheese, Sweet potato soufflé, broccoli casserole, cornbread dressing, green beans, congealed salad, deviled eggs. Desserts not pictured included: pumpkin pie, pecan pie and chocolate pie. Shameful!

The meat: Smoked Turkey breast and Boston Butt (I cheated this year and ordered this from our church youth group. 2 birds with one stone - got my meat for Thanksgiving and supported our church's youth ministries.)

Laying around after our meal

A belated birthday gift to Ellie from Aunt Anna and Uncle Amos - Olaf. She loved it, of course. Anything Frozen makes her extremely happy

Even Freddie was in a food coma

Uncle Amos and Aunt Anna. So glad to be able to spend some time with them!

Loving on Grandma and Papa

My sweet growing girls. Mack was napping.

Mack finally decided to wake up from his nap and hang out with us. 

Aunt Anna spoiled the girls with iPhone games and songs. They did so much of it, her battery died in her phone. 

I had to put this picture in here. For those of you who know my mother and her highly skilled ability to use/see her iPhone, this is pretty funny. I think she might be trying to take a selfie here? Not sure. She is most likely accidentally face timing someone. Mack can probably help her. 

Elle and Mack telling Freddie about what kind of tree we are going to get. 

All loaded up in daddy's truck ready to hit the tree farm. 

"We like this one"

Trying to gather the crew for a picture

And, this is the winner! 

Ellie's 6 year check up

I know I write this on every birthday, but it is truly hard to believe Ellie is 6 years old! She is quite entertaining at this age!  She is still very active being involved in gymnastics, ballet, tap, and Wednesday night church. Needless to say, I miss her now more than ever with being in school all day and extracurricular activities. She still wants to be a singer/dancer when she grows up. She is doing great in kindergarten, getting glowing remarks from her teacher on her report card. She is reading really well now and LOVES it! This makes my heart happy:) She is a good big sister, especially in the tattling department. (Which actually comes in handy with a 1 year old sibling.) Her energy levels are exhausting at times, but she consistently has a smile on her face. There is certainly never a dull moment. 

Even though she's been 6 for a couple of months now, she just had her 6 year check up. These are her stats: weight 40lb. - this puts her in 20th percentile.for her age. This is better than previous years. Her height is 45inches which is 40th percentile. I feel like she is graduating from her peanut status, FINALLY! She is definitely still small, but she is dynamite for sure! Love her so much!

This is Ellie dressed as an Indian for her school Thanksgiving feast.

UGA vs. Auburn

This past weekend we traveled to Athens to celebrate E.W. (Worth's dad) birthday and to attend the UGA vs. Auburn game. It was a rare weekend in which all the stars aligned and my parents were able to keep all 3 children, and Worth and I were able to do this trip without children. Believe me, I missed them terribly, but it was soooooo nice to actually hold a conversation with someone and not have to stop every other word to chase/discipline/protect a child.

Friday night was E.W.'s birthday, so we had tickets to see Kip Moore at the Classic Center. Kip is a country singer that is making his way up the music celebrity ladder. Kip went to high school with Worth and I and was on the golf team coached by E.W. Worth and I aren't big country music fans but it was fun to go see someone we went to high school with perform on stage. It was really strange and funny all at the same time. I think Worth and I were just secretly proud of ourselves for staying out WAY past our normal bedtime. I didn't know if I would make it when we were waiting  between acts for Kip to hit the stage. I was the grandma in the crowd going " I mean, it's almost 10:00! Why isn't he on stage yet?" But I rallied and we had a great time.

Saturday, we slept in and had some quality time with my nephew Bo. His personality is really starting to show and he was great Saturday morning entertainment! He is such a precious little boy, and I can't wait to meet his little brother who should arrive around Christmas Eve. After finally getting ready, we headed to the tailgate early that afternoon.  It was very cold, but we were wearing several layers. Game time came and I almost chickened out because it had gotten so bitterly cold at the tailgate. I decided if I was in Athens with no kids - rain, sleet, snow or shine, I was going to that game. Once in the stadium it honestly wasn't that bad. With several layers of clothing, a ski jacket, ski gloves, hand warmers shoved in every bit of clothing, people sitting beside you in their big jackets, a blanket, and a hot chocolate, I was almost comfortable. It did start to get cold at the end of the 2nd half but we decided to leave at that point because UGA had such an awesome lead over AU. We were so proud of our Dawgs!

All in all a great weekend. We were happy, however, to get home to our munchkins and 70 degree weather in Valdosta on Sunday. I wish I had taken more pictures over the weekend, but I mainly took videos, and I'm too lazy this week to download them all to you tube to get them on the blog. Maybe later?

Kip doing his thing. This picture looks far away but we were actually pretty close to the stage. 

Tailgating in 40 degree weather. We made the Bulldawg Illustrated web page! 

Gymnastics updates

Here are a couple of videos of the girls at gymnastics recently. Ellie is improving a ton! Ellie has especially gotten good on the bar, but the bar is so far away from where the parents sit, I haven't been able to get a great video of it.  Emma is surprisingly pretty good in her preschool class and seems to not have any fear of anything they want her to do. They both love it, and I'll have to admit, it is an excellent way for them to get their energy out on a Thursday afternoon!

Halloween 2014

Last night we had a great time with friends and family celebrating Halloween. Despite Worth being under the weather (we are pretty sure he has the flu now, and yes, he got a flu shot) we pulled off a great party and some awesome trick or treating that involved a hay ride in our neighborhood. I made the parents dress up as well this year, and we had some interesting costumes. The only way I got out of being Elsa, was if I was a witch. So, my costume was not very creative, but very easy to put together. Ellie and Emma were Elsa and Anna (of course.) Worth was Bob the Builder, and Mack was supposed to be Willie from Duck Dynasty, but his costume lasted less than 10 seconds before he ripped it off. These are just a few pictures from our night.

Video Entertainment

Children can be so entertaining. Especially, when they are not making you want to pull your hair out. I took some videos of them the other night because they all 3 had me in stitches. Who needs a television, when you have a 6, 3, and 1 year old.

This first video occurred because Emma came in for dinner and just began blurting out what she had learned at school earlier that day about the pledge of allegiance. She told me all about it and then proceeded to recite it at the dinner table. After dinner I wanted her to do it again so I could film her and Ellie decided she wanted to join in and explain why we say the pledge of allegiance. 

The next video is a video of Ellie singing and dancing. This is not something that is unusual in our house, but what is so funny is Mack joining in by dancing at the end of the video. I'm not sure where he's hearing the rhythm but he was obviously feeling the beat!



The final video is a video Emma requested to do after Ellie sang and danced. I'm not sure what songs she's singing, but I do believe it is a Frozen medley of some sort. She is not usually the ham that Ellie is, so I thoroughly enjoyed seeing her perform for the camera.

Dash

Meet the newest member of our family. He's been hanging around for a couple of months with Aspen and Freddie. The past few weeks he has allowed us to touch him and he comes in with the other cats to eat. We'll see if he decides to stick around after his visit to the vet this week! I guess we are a family of eight now! 

Getting Ready For Fall

Although the nice fall weather has not arrived in south Georgia, we are trying to get ready for the Halloween/Thanksgiving season. I finally got all of our Halloween decorations out and we are slowly decorating with them. The girls and I made some fun pumpkins this weekend that were actually pretty easy to make. It involved melting orange and black crayons on white pumpkins. I would advise if you try this at home to have 2 people with hairdryers and it will go a lot faster. It took us FOREVER to get the crayons to melt because you can't use the hairdryer on high or it will splatter crayon everywhere. Luckily, we had enough people to do it in shifts so it ended up not being so bad.

Ellie did a good job heating the crayons when she was actually aiming the hairdryer at the crayons

The black kind of took over, so I would advise doubling up on the orange crayons 

Emma kept us straight by making sure we were following the directions 

Finished product. Turned out cute, very easy, and inexpensive.

Supercalifragilisticexpealidocious!

Emma's 1st UGA game

This past weekend we headed to Athens to cheer on the Dawgs against Tennessee. The game was at noon on Saturday, so we thought it would be a perfect time to take the girls. Ellie had been to a game before, but this was Emma's first time in Sanford Stadium. She has frequented many tailgates but has never been to an actual game.

The weather was nice Saturday morning at the tailgate. At the game however, our seats are in the sun and it did get a little warm. Despite Ellie continually asking, "Did we lose?" throughout the entire game and Emma being ultra whiny (for Emma,) we had a great time. (We do think Emma may have been coming down with something, because she was running a fever when we got home Sunday.) This of course making me feel like a terrible mother forcing her to endure a hot, crowded football game!

We stayed with Kate, Jay and Bo in their new abode in Athens. There was a lot of cousin time that involved tee ball, chasing, screaming, renouncing (Ellie's version of the word announcing) and fun. I, unfortunately didn't get a ton of pictures, but here are a few from our weekend.

The girls got their faces painted by Ms. Lollipop. Ellie, of course went with the face paint that the UGA cheerleaders wear, Emma chose a bulldog paw. 

They were really frustrated that we weren't walking to the game yet in this picture.  Ellie kept saying "We are missing the game!" Even though the game didn't start for another 30 minutes

A smile

They got to share a coke as promised. You can't go to a football game and not have a good coca cola! 

Ellie cheering on the Dawgs

Emma throughout the 1st quarter. I should've known she didn't feel good. I took her to the bathroom at one point and asked if she didn't feel good or if she was just tired. She said "I don't feel good." I asked her what hurt, and she responded, "My barrette." So I adjusted the barrette, and she perked up to rally for the rest of the game. 

E.W. got E & E another sweet treat. A red icy for Ellie and a blue one for Emma.  Good for a hot game!

Emma and Mack fighting over Bo's cozy coupe

Ellie turns 6!

It's hard to believe that 6 years ago was Ellie's birth. She came into the world kicking and screaming and, well, not much has changed in the past 6 years. She is still quite the bossy pants she has always been (which proves to be a great big sister skill.) She is hard headed, smart, sassy, and FULL of life and energy. Since she has started kindergarten, it is eerily quiet around our house. Emma looked at me when she was eating lunch a couple of weeks ago and said, "Mommy, I miss Ellie." I shared her feelings! Ellie definitely adds an element to our household that is terribly missed when she is not around.

Since I've had a gazillion things going on, I am just now posting this. Ellie's birthday was last Friday, the 19th. She was so excited this year about turning 6. Worth took doughnuts to her class for breakfast on Friday morning. For dinner that night, we went out to the Wooden Nickel Pub (Ellie's request) for dinner and followed that up with frozen yogurt at The Mix.

Saturday, was the birthday party. Ellie had been planning this party since her birthday party last year. We had a gymnastics party this year at the YMCA. Ellie made her list of who she wanted to invite and helped me get the invitations together. She had requested a Mary Poppins party, so it was kind of hard to come up with invitations, etc. There isn't too much out there for Mary Poppins. Thank goodness for Etsy, which came through for me with Mary Poppins paraphernalia. I think she and everyone else at the party had a great time. It was the easiest birthday party I've ever done. The Y handled everything, down to cutting the cake and writing down gifts! (I did ask party goers not to bring gifts, but some kids did anyway. Most of them hand made cards, which I thought was such a sweet gift!)

The pictures are kind of scattered. Our main camera broke (thanks to Mack, AKA: The Destroyer) so I have been using a combination of a small Canon we have (which is terrible,) my phone, and borrowed pictures from Worth's mom's camera.

The morning of Ellie's birthday. Emma and Mack gave her a Mary Poppins doll

Proof that Mack was there celebrating with us that morning. Clearly, he wasn't happy about the attention not being on him. 

Hard to get over the fact that she is 6! She was dressed in her Lowndes Viking attire for spirit day, complete with a Viking tattoo on her cheek. 

Saturday morning, Grandma and Papa came by to give her their gift before the birthday party.  Freddie wanted to see what she got as well. 

Grandma did the whole, box in a box wrapping trick on Ellie

The last box led her to their car which had another box in it. 

The other box.See video at bottom to see what was inside!

Ellie and her Mia at the birthday party. This time with a Frozen tattoo instead of a Viking

Playing with the parachute. The girls that did this party were great!

Mack pointed Ellie out for Grandma

Beam walking

Emma showing off. 

A brief moment.

Mack wanted to do gymnastics as well. 

Silly girls

Mack and his E.W,

The cake. The lady that made this for us did an awesome job!
 Publix, unfortunately didn't have a Mary Poppins cake:(

Mack liked the cake as well. Even though I had to chase him around to feed it to him. 

Opening some gifts. 

Below are 2 videos of some big gifts Ellie got for her birthday. The first is the gift Worth and I gave her and the second video is the gift my parents gave her (after she opened all the different sized boxes.)