Easter Dresses and Egg Hunts

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter!! Ours was filled with three days of egg hunts, two days of church, and sugar-fed celebration!

On Friday, the kids, "Farmer", Baby Wesley, and myself attended the Easter Eggstravaganza at the Centerville Community Center near my house. WOW was it crowded! Harbin "hunted" three broken eggs with no candy, and waited in line FOREVER to bounce in the bounce house. The kids did enjoy the farm animals like the goats and bunnies. I was also able to catch a few good pics of the kids dressed up for the hunt.

Saturday was much more laid back. Daddy came home that morning and we joined some close friends of ours for lunch and an egg hunt at their house. Harbin and Sam didn't come up short on eggs this time and Catherine even snagged a few for herself. Later that evening the kids got to meet the Easter Bunny at Farmer's neighborhood Egg Hunt. You can see how enthused the were...

Our church had three services this year, one Sat. night and two Sun. morning. The choir sang in all of them, so I was busy a lot throughout the weekend. Sunday morning was rushed since we woke up 5 minutes AFTER I was supposed to be at the church (darned alarm clocks)!!! Needless to say, I was able to get ready, get a few shots of the kids opening their Easter Baskets and make it to the church by 9. Scott did a great job getting the kids all dolled up in their Easter best and joining me at church 20 minutes later.

Sunday afternoon we had a great lunch at my mom's house followed by more Easter surprises and, of course, EGG HUNTS!! Two of the guys from Scott's unit- Mike and Mike- joined us for the egg hunt. By this point in the weekend, Catherine had the hang of the hunt. She would hold Scott's hand, walk to the next egg, promptly let go, squat down, pick up the egg, put it in the basket and return to finger holding position, ready to walk to the next egg!!

Enjoy the pics. I should have them all up on Shutterfly soon with a link on the right.

The mom.

Tennessee Aquarium

On our way home from West Virginia, the kids and I stopped in Chattanooga to see Aunt Crickett, Grandmommy and Bo. On Monday, we went with Aunt Crickett to the Tennessee Aquarium. The kids have been mulitple times, but it is always neat to see their reactions to the many exhibits.

Catherine loved the touch tanks- you know how they always say that at least one kid a week will fall in the tank???? I have no doubt that will be Catherine one day. She just stood with her arms hanging into the tank patiently waiting for something to swim up. Nothing

ever touched her, but it would have been interesting to see how she reacted if something did.

Harbin's favorite this time seemed to be the Jellyfish. He is definitely NOT a fan of the butterfly garden and he's still a little nervous about sticking his hand in the touch tanks. He did enjoy crawling under the tanks to experience being "inside" the water with the crabs.

After the aquarium we were able to meet up with some friends that were visiting from Boston. Avaleigh (the little girl in the pics) had grown so much since the last time we all saw her. She and the kids enjoyed running around and climbing outside the Aquarium.

After lunch we grabbed some ice cream. As you can see, the kids really enjoyed it!!

Since the next few posts will be about Easter, I thought I would take a moment to catch you all up on some new milestones the kids have made. From the pictures you can tell that Catherine is definitely walking, however, she hasn't done so much of it since we returned home. I guess she is just reverting to her old ways here at home. Harbin has been working on "school" all the time, which typically consists of writing his letters (now he will even try his lower case letters) and spelling words. He can spell his first name, Mommy, and Daddy without any help. We are still working on writing from left to right. Unless I make lines for the letters, you often can't tell what he was spelling since the letters are all over the page!!! He loves to do school and I am glad that he is so easy to teach!!

Easter is just around the corner, and I will have lots of fun posts with the kids at egg hunts, dressed up pretty, and who knows what else!!!

Until then, Happy Easter!!
The mom.

Snowshoe, West Virginia

Last week, we were able to take a family vacation to Snowshoe, West Virginia. Scott had a friend from his younger days who was getting married up there, so we all decided to make a ski vacation out of it. Chuck, Melissa, Skylar, and Alex joined us as well (I guess technically we joined them).

The trip was interesting to say the least. We started out by traveling through the night (about 8.5 hours) with 6 of us packed into Chuck's huge truck (our van decided to give us issues just days before departing on our trip). We arrived at 7:00am and were fortunate enough to be able to check into our room. We unloaded the truck and Scott and Alex got ready to go skiing. We bundled the kids up and took them to the slopes too. Harbin had his own set of skis (thanks be to Skylar's boss for hooking us up with free ski equipment)- he didn't enjoy skiing quite as much as the older boys. He didn't freak out about being on the skis, but he did ask politely to "get them off his feet".

After deciding the kids weren't really into the snow, Melissa and I decided to hop in the truck and explore the activities that were around. Shortly after driving around some of the area, we got a call from Scott saying that Alex had been taken to the med clinic- he broke his arm. Needless to say, his trip was instantly less exciting- he no longer could ski, ride his bike, or go to the pool. He seemed to handle it well, and the kids and I enjoyed his company in the condo, since we weren't out on the slopes either!

On the third day of our trip we decided to try out the pool. It was a very neat design and was heated both indoors and out. They had a "doggie door" type thing that you went through in order to go outside and not have to get out of the water. The slide inside was great- Harbin could do it by himself and Catherine enjoyed riding down with daddy. Harbin's favorite was probably the outdoor slide since it was longer and winded around.

The wedding was on Saturday and the weather was beautiful. It was relatively warm considering we were at a ski resort. The bride was beautiful and everything seemed to go smoothly. Harbin and Lolly enjoyed many Shirley Temples, and Catherine enjoyed the pass hors d'oeuvres (hmmm...Catherine like food being brought to her- imagine that!!!).

Catherine learned to walk on our trip. Although she had taken steps prior to going to WV, she really started toddling around up there. She liked having the freedom and toddled some here and there at the wedding. She was pretty cute.

Scott, the kids and I returned to Chattanooga late Saturday night. Scott had to leave Sunday morning for work and then to Fort Benning for the week, but the kids and I stuck around to see Crickett, Bo and Grandmommy (a post and pics to come on that).

We were able to get a lot of great pictures this last week (see our new family one up top). I hope you enjoy them all!!!

The mom.

A Belated Birthday Blog

Ok, ok, ok, so I know that I am terribly behind on keeping you all informed on the happenings around here, but life has been hectic around here lately (future posts on all that). I have finally gotten around to showing you the kids at their birthday party.


This year was quite an adventure, since we did a dual birthday party. It was the first time I have not had a party at my house, and boy it was difficult to remember and set up everything!!! Catherine awoke that morning (having spent hours in the ER the night before) with a fever and a stuffy nose, and Harbin's fever skyrocketed before the party even started. Needless to say, we went on with the festivities, the kids doped up on Motrin!



As usual, my mom did an excellent job making the cakes. Harbin's Spiderman Cake has been unofficially voted her best cake yet. Amazingly, we had two cakes and 24 cupcakes, and we came home with NOTHING left over!!!


Harbin was more than excited when we blew up the bounce house. I had picked it up, but he had no idea it was in the back of the van until the party. He and all his cousins and friends had a blast jumping and playing in the house- of course, it was SPIDERMAN!

Catherine was getting pretty tired by the time we did her cake. She wasn't all about shoving the cupcake into her mouth- mostly she just poked her fingers into it.

Harbin (and Catherine) were given a Jeep by the Tinney family. As you can see from the picture- "Daddy's Jeep is just like mine." (Harbin's words). They custom painted it to match Scott's jeep and decked it out with Tennessee stickers. He also enjoyed getting a toy from my mom, that many, many, oh so many years ago was mine. It's a box of pieces that fit together in various ways making all kinds of musical instruments- this is no longer MY favorite toy- can you imagine why?

Thanks to everyone who joined us in celebrating the birth of our precious children. Although they weren't at their best, I know they had a wonderful time and we have memories to share from having friends and family together.

The mom.




(Thanks to Crickett for making Catherine's adorable cupcake dress!!)