Chicken Scratch

Welcome Baby Blake!

My nephew was born last Wednesday and I. am. in. love. I knew I would love him (I mean who doesn't love a baby, especially when they're family) but I am seriously smitten with him. I saw him Wednesday evening when he was born, twice again on Thursday, and I spent most of Friday at the hospital again. He got to go home Saturday but my little sister lives about 45 minutes away so I won't get to see him all the time. :( I do have plans to go see them this Wednesday and I can't wait. :) My cousin's wife is due in May and my other (older) little sister is due in June. 3 new babies in the family by this summer, and I can't wait!

Anyways, here is Baby Blake. Isn't he the sweetest???!?! :)

Just 2 hours old

1 day old

I made this framed birth announcement for my little sister. I saw the idea on etsy and thought it was just too cute. :)

So again I lost my camera cord. I don't know what my deal is. Usually I put it right away in the same drawer when I'm done. I've been missing it since last Wednesday (hence the pics of my nephew being posted so late). But I discovered this evening the USB cord for my digi frame works on my camera as well. Yay! So I will get caught up on blogging. I've digi scrapped a little and decorated for St. Patty's Day. I'll share those in the coming days. :)

Wordless Wednesday

Okay, not so *wordless* but I wanted to blog a tiny bit since we just got back from vacation. We went down to the Texas coast for a few days and played on the beach. Then we went to Houston for a couple more days and visited NASA, the Downtown Aquarium, and the Houston Museum of Natural Science. We had a great time but are happy to be home (our dogs are happy to have us home, too!) Tomorrow I get my wisdom teeth removed (eek!) so I won't be online for a couple more days. After that just two weeks left of summer vacation :( - although I'm sooooo looking forward to fall, my favorite time of year! I hope to squeeze in a little bit more summer fun with Kaleigh before school starts back. :)

Well, I would appreciate any thoughts and prayers for me tomorrow. And I hope everyone has a great weekend!

A Special Painting

When my Nanny passed away three years ago, my mom inherited two paintings Nanny had painted. My parents moved shortly thereafter and the paintings have been in storage since. My mom unpacked them a few weeks ago and let me have one of them and brought it to me last week. I hung it on the wall in our living room this afternoon. I've been wanting to add little touches of blue to my red and yellow decor and this is perfect for that. I love it and it's a special reminder of Nanny each time I look at it.

 

Kaleigh's Dance Recital

This afternoon was Kaleigh's dance recital. She did great and looked so beautiful! I did a little extra on her eye makeup this year and a little darker lipstick. She absolutely loved it but she looked a little too old for me. *sniff sniff* Anyways, here are some pics from our day. :)

Ready for her tap routine

 

Tap routine
 

Ballet routine

Mommy, Kaleigh, and Daddy

Daddy was gracious enough to share his Father's Day with her dance recital - not that he had a choice LOL but he was a good sport. ;) (And so were the other fathers in our family who came out today.)

Me and my sweet Boo

We celebrated Father's Day afterwards with our families at Salt Grass Steakhouse. It was a great day!

 

Happy Birthday, Brandi

Today would have been my sister, Brandi's, 31st birthday. I hope she's having a big birthday party in Heaven today. :)

I love and miss you so much, Lulu!

 

Love,
your big sister

Awesome Weekend

I had an awesome weekend this past weekend. :) It started with Kaleigh having her last day of school on Friday. She got out at noon and to celebrate we went to the movies to see Shrek 4 and then had ice cream afterwards. We ended the day with hanging out that evening across the street with our neighbors/new friends.

Kaleigh on the morning of her last day being a 1st grader *sniff sniff*

For Kaleigh's end-of-year teacher gift we gave her teacher the new ABCs Scentsy warmer. Normally I do a handmade gift but this was too cute so I had to splurge on it. Kaleigh and I each made her teacher a card.

My card (not digging how I did the *heart* part but oh well)

Kaleigh's card
 

And I had to share her super sweet note she wrote on the inside

Saturday afternoon was Kaleigh's dance portraits. She was adorable in her costume but she always looks so grown up all dressed up. *sniff sniff*
 

Saturday evening we went with friends to Southern Junction (a local country bar) to see Robert Earl Keen. We absolutely love him and seeing him live. Hubby and I haven't been dancing in forever (for sure not since I was pregnant with Kaleigh - which is sad because that's how we met and it's all we did dating; it's a love we both share). We were a little rusty getting started but we had it back down in no time. And a few pounds heavier but man if we went dancing more often we could lose some serious weight! LOL We can't believe it's taken us so long to get back to dancing and plan on doing it more often.

Hubby and I before we left for the evening

My new outfit and boots

At the bar with one of my bestest and dearest friends, Kandi
 

Hubby giving me a kiss on the dance floor *swoon*

It was an awesome evening! And then Sunday was a nice LAZY day and a great way to end our weekend. Thanks for letting me share. :)

 

My Weekend

Friday was a great day! I started off the morning hitting a few garage sales with a Dark Cherry Mocha (my latest addiction) and Lady Antebellum in the CD player. Unfortunately, there weren't too many garage sales going on but I did manage to get this old frame and enamelware cup for $2. Can't beat that! I love old frames and I collect red and white enamelware so I definitely scored. :)

 

After the garage sales I hit Sam Moon and got a new purse for spring with matching wallet and makeup bag. I love it!

I also hit one of my favorite antique stores afterwards. I found some old red feedsack material that I'm going to use to recover the chairs of our dining room table (2 yards for $7). I got this 9x12 vintage fabric remnant for $0.99. Not sure yet what I'm going to do with it but I loved the print and colors.

I love old buttons and got all of these for $4.

And finally I got this doily for $3 and an old wooden hanger for $4. I haven't decided what I'm doing with the hanger yet. Maybe I'll hang it in the laundry room with a vintage linen of some sort. Or I'll make some piece of altered art to hang from it.

The best part of the day though was just alone time to myself, gorgeous weather, and driving my hubby's Jeep with the windows down and the radio blaring. It was an awesome day!

Saturday the three of us went wheelin'. I haven't been in forever with my hubby and it was a nice family outing.

And this evening we went to my sister's for our monthly family dinners. My sister (with a little help from her future mother-in-law) made homemade gumbo and bread pudding for dessert and it was so yummy! My birthday is coming up next week so we celebrated that, too, with cake.

So that was my fun (and busy) weekend! This week I'll be getting ready for Kaleigh's birthdays... her friends party is Friday evening and her family party is Sunday. I hope you have a great week!

 

Fun Day at the Circus

Today we went to the Shrine Circus. This circus is special to me because my Popaw was a Shriner and he and my Mimi took my sisters and I and our cousin to this circus when we were little. We had so much fun today and actually preferred this circus to the big Barnum and Bailey one. Not to mention it was held at the Dr Pepper Arena in Frisco, which is a small and intimate venue. Pretty much any seat in there is a good seat. It was a great afternoon together as a family. :)

 

I've always loved the elephants. Kaleigh does, too. :)
 

There was the CUTEST act! A clown had 3 stuffed animals. He tried winding the first two up with a giant fake key but they didn't do anything so he kicked them off to the side. The third one, an elephant, he wound up and it did come to life. It would walk around, then wind down, fall over, and he'd have to wind it back up. This went on for a little bit and made us laugh. The clown wound up the elephant one last time but he did it too tight and it *broke*. The clown was sad and tried to fix it, turning the elephant over this way and that. Then he unzipped it and out jumped a real dog. It was so cute and that dog was adorable (and super smart, too, the way he performed!) My brief summary here doesn't do it justice. You'd have to see it to appreciate it. :) But here's a picture of the dog in the elephant costume following the clown.
 

A family snapshot after the show. <3
 

I'm so thankful for fun little family afternoons like this.

  

Remembering Brandi

Today is the 11-year anniversary of my sister's passing. For those that don't know, we lost my sister, Brandi, to cancer in 1999. She was just 19 years old.

Miss you and love you so very much, Lulu!

 

   

Meet Wilbur

Last weekend my parents' former neighbor found a piglet on a deer lease. He discovered it alone and watched it for a few hours but never saw its mom or litter mates. After a while he went up to the piglet and it came right to him. It even still had its umbilical cord. He decided to bring it home. His wife called my mom since my parents live out in the country and raise animals. Kaleigh and I were staying with my parents this week for Spring Break so we rode with my mom Monday to pick up the piglet.

We named him Wilbur, since we pray he will be *Some Pig* and *Terrific* and become a pet and not food. ;) He is so tiny and absolutely precious! He's not afraid of people, will crawl right up in your lap, and loves to push his nose against your skin. He has to be bottlefed every few hours and this week we worked on teaching him to use the litter box and today we even tried him on a leash. He's such a sweet little thing and I'm so smitten with him! My mom brought Kaleigh and me home tonight and I miss him already!

Anyways, here are some photos of him I took this week. Isn't he precious? :)

Warning: Photo Heavy! ;)

Monday

 

My size 7 flip flop so you can see his size
 

 

Sleeping in the crook of my mom's arm
 

Sleeping on my leg (I'm sitting Indian style)

Tuesday

Feeding time!

Play time! He loves to push his nose against your skin. His favorite is pushing against your hand, almost like he's wrestling. And he pushes this mini tennis ball around with his nose, too. :)
 

Sleepy time! He sleeps in a box on a towel with a heating pad underneath. We throw in a tshirt or a stuffed bear for him to snuggle.
 

 

 

And these photos from Tuesday pretty much show what he does all day... eat, play, sleep, repeat - just like a newborn baby. :)

Wednesday

Just a couple sleeping pics today. <3
 

 

Thursday

It was a pretty day today so we took him outside to play. We tried working with him on a leash.
 

 

 

Following my mom around.

Wilbur and my mom.

And now you have met sweet little Wilbur. :)