Peter Pan and Tinkerbell

Harbin and Catherine had a Peter Pan and Tinkerbell party to celebrate their turning 5 and 3 this year. We were blessed to have a lot of family and friends join us to celebrate and the kids really enjoyed getting to show everyone the new house.

I finally pulled out my new (as in new in the box even though I have now owned it for 1.5 years) sewing machine to make Harbin's Peter Pan costume. Thanks to Aunt Sarah and Uncle Bo for stopping last minute to get Catherine an age appropriate TinkerBell costume since the one I had opened up was ummm... well not really suited for ANY age!!

We were pleasantly suprised to have warmer weather for the birthday party. We've been experiencing a rather cold winter and the high was somewhere in the low 60's for the party, so it was nice to see the kids get to play outside.

As usual, my mom made the Tinkerbell and Peter Pan cakes and they turned out wonderfully. We didn't even end up with tons of leftovers- not true for the hotdogs, which we will be eating for months!

The kids are very thankful for all of the great presents they got and for everyone getting to celebrate with us. Enjoy the pics!
The mom.

Happy 5th Birthday, Harbin

Harbin turned 5 last week and I just can't believe the time has gone by so quickly. We celebrated in Augusta because Daddy was traning out there and it turned out to be a great birthday for him. We got to stay the night in a hotel (which is always fun for the kids) and then we woke up to take Daddy to work. When we first woke up, Harbin asked if he was 5 yet. When we told him yes, he promptly stood up, stretched and said "yep, I'm bigger." Then Scott got dressed and Harbin said "your the first Army guy I've seen since I was 5." He really can be hilarious sometimes!!

We got ready for the day, checked out of the hotel and headed to the bowling alley on base. Harbin, Catherine and Lydia had fun bowling a game before Daddy and some of the guys joined us for lunch and another game. Harbin didn't use the dragon to bowl with, but he did use the bumpers. He was still very proud of his strike as you can see from one of the pics I took of the screen. He decided to go by Bbay for "Birthday Boy". There is also a pic of Lydia pouting when it wasn't her turn and a pic of their teeny tiny bowling shoes- can you believe they had some that fit Lydia!!!

After lunch and bowling we headed to the PX to let him pick out his birthday present. This PX had no toys, so he ended up picking out a Wii game that he thought he would like- it's Winter Sports which seemed very appropriate since we have been watching so much of the Winter Olympics.

We had to say good-bye to Daddy and head back towards Suwanee. We ate dinner with my mom and then headed to watch the North Gwinnett Basketball game. By the time we got home that evening, we were all WIPED OUT!!!

Harbin has been learning so much over the last year and always amazes me with his apt for learning as well as some of the things he can come up with. He is ready very fluently now and has litle difficulty reading even moving words like closed captioning or songs at church. He LOVES to read big books and will spend hours looking through them. Just the other day he really impressed me when he asked me if Daddy was in Maine. I had to ask him to repeat himself again and again so I could figure out what he was asking. He finally said that Augusta was the capital of Maine and he knew Daddy was in Augusta!! I WAS QUITE AMAZED!! I of course taught him that some cities are in two or three different states and that Daddy was still in GA, not Maine.

You can tell from the slideshow that Harbin loves to perform. He is dressed up in many of the pictures and he loves to "play the part". Sometimes he can get a ittle bossy with his sisters wanting them to do exactly as he has thought out, but all in all he is still a great big brother to them.

Enjoy the pics of his 4 year old days and stay tuned for pics of the combined birthday party.
The mom.

More snow pics...

My mom came over on Saturday morning to play in the snow with the kids. She brought a plastic sled that worked even on our very flat yard. You can see in the pics even Lydia loved it... she looks like she is practicing for the Luge in a few of the pics!!!

Harbin had a great time throwing snowballs at my mom and pushing Catherine around in the sled!

The mom.

Snow and Snow Cream

We had an unusual snow fall today and Atlanta (yes Atlanta) got about 4 inches of snow!!!!

Scott is out of town this week, so it was just me to take the kids out in the snow (hence the terrible picture taking). It was hard juggling the camera, the kids, the gloves, the cold, and the all important carrots for our snowmen's noses!!!

I will take this moment to tell you a bit about the house we have moved to. Our house in Snellville never sold (after 43 showings) and so we found some great tenants who are renting it and we are renting a wonderful house only a block from Scott's high school. He is walking or biking to work each day and it's really amazing how much more we get to see him!! The house itself is a 2500 square foot ranch on an equal sized basement. Although we only have 3 bedrooms upstairs, we have MORE than enough space for all of us. The girls have done well sharing a room and we are enjoying the added living space we didn't have in our old house. The house is situated on a little over 2 acres (amazing for this part of Atlanta) and we have 4 attached garages, two garages at the back of the property and a small "barn". You can see some of this in the pictures. I am trying frantically to utiize al the space we have and over-organize everything in the house. The kids really enjoy the basement which has a rec room, probably about 800 square feet and even has a tile dance floor with a disco light!!!! Scott has a gym now set up in a separate room in the basement and eventually when I finish unpacking I will have a craft room down there too. There is another room that we are calling an office, although it's mosty used for boxes of junk right now.

Anyways, I say all of this to tell you about our snow playing day....

You can see from the pics out the sunroom window that we had plenty of snow to play in. We are no longer in a subdivision and we missed getting to play in the snow with our old neighbors (we miss you Josh and Kirsten), but the kids also enjoy getting to check on their snow-family which hasn't been ruined by unruly neighborhood children.

When we first went outside in the snow, Lydia just started bawling. She did not enjoy wearing the socks on her hands (we didn't have enough kids gloves) or the hat on her head and she DEFINITELY didn't like that the snow made it hard to walk. I decided to let her tough it out for about 5 minutes before I put her back in the sunroom so she could have a good time watching us. Well, I was right... she had a great time watching us until I- the most terrible mom ever- thought it would be funny to throw a snowball at her (through the window). It hit the window just above her head and she instantly burst into tears. I think she continued crying the enitre time we were outside and let's just say I think she takes after her mom and prefers SUN AND SAND- not SNOW!

Harbin attempted sledding on a rubbermaid tub lid, however, we have no slope whatsoever to our yard, so that didn't go very well.

Catherine and Harbin thought building a snowman was fun, but quickly tired out. We had a lot of snow and the snowballs got hard to roll. Catherine enjoyed walking in the path I made from rolling the snowball, but went in shortly after putting the Daddy snowman together. Harbin hung in there to help me with a few more sections of the other snow people. In the end, I was outside putting together the Mommy, Daddy, Harbin, Catherine, and Lydia snowmen while the kids stood in the sunroom window watching.

After our playing outside, we brought some clean snow in and made "Snow Cream". The kids (and the new baby) really loved this!! We even had chocolate syrup and cherries to make the Snow Cream Sunday complete.

To top off the whole day of snow, we watched a little bit of the opening ceremonies to the Winter Olympics before the kids headed to bed!!

And now, I am exhausted from all the snowball rolling and headed to bed myself!
Keepin' Warm!
The mom.

Happy 3rd Birthday, Catherine

I can't believe it, but Catherine just turned 3!! She has grown up so much over the last few months. She is becoming quite the little girl and I think some of the attitude is wearing off- for now anyways.

She really enjoys getting to play with Harbin, although I have noticed so much of personality comes out in the moments I get to spend with just her. She has quite the imagination and has recently started to enjoy hours of playing with her baby dolls or her dollhouse. Each day she is learning so much- her ABC's, counting, colors, and songs. Right now, her favorite song is the most adorable rendition of "Zaccheus Was A Wee Little Man". I have started having her memorize some of the same verses Harbin does for Cubbies and it's amazing what her little mind can remember.

For her birthday, we went to Cici's pizza. She sort of got nervous about the whole birthday thing this year. She woke up a little after midnight on her birthday and was up off and on for about 4 hours. It's like her mind wouldn't rest about the next day. So, when we arrived at Cici's she ate and didn't really want to participate in the birthday part. She held her Daddy tightly while they blew out the candles, Lydia opened her presents, and Wesley like wearing her birthday crown :)

Anyways, I got a few pics from her birthday and the slideshow is each month from 2 years old to 3 years old. (Yes, I admit, the one of her "pregnant" is disturbing, but she and Harbin really like playing house these days and I guess a pregnant mommy is what they're used to!!)

Happy Birthday Catherine!
The mom.

Surprise, Surprise....

...well at least for some of you. The rest of you either already know or saw it coming. We are very pleased to announce that Tinney Baby #4 is due to arrive on July 18th!!!

I am 17 weeks along now and feeling much better than I did during my first trimester. I had no morning sickness with my first three pregnancies, but boy did I with this one. Fortunately I didn't feel nearly as tired during my first trimester, which was a blessing since I didn't feel like eating much or gagged when I did.

We hope to find out the gender of the baby in about 4 weeks, so stay tuned for that. The kids are all super excited about getting a new little brother or sister. I think Catherine and Harbin are having a great time trying to counsel Lydia on what it's like to be a big sister.

Stay tuned for more on the new little one!!!
The mom (of many).

New Years' Eve

This year for New Years' we ran our 2nd annual Flashlight 5K. This time the kids didn't ride along in the stroller but instead waited with a friend of ours. Both Scott and I ran, although after seeing my terrible finish time, I question whether or not I was actually running :)

After the 5K, they served dinner and we ate with some friends and then headed back to the house to watch Tennessee in the Chik-Fil-A bowl. The kids, of course, were decked out in their Tennessee gear, at least until the girls decided it was time for PJ's.

We put Lydia to bed about her normal time this year, but the older two kids had the option of staying up. Catherine actually stayed awake until midnight, but Harbin dozed off and on for the 20 minutes leading up to the ball drop. We watched the ball drop, the daredevil jump and then we all went to bed!!!

We wish everyone has a very HAPPY NEW YEAR!!
The mom.

Medeival Times

For Christmas, I gave Scott family ticketes to Medieval Times here in the Gwinnett Area. He has wanted to go for awhile, but even though the kids are free, the tickets are just so expensive.

Anyways, we went on December 30th and it was a blast. For those of you who don't know, they serve dinner (with no silverware) and do a Medeival Times show which includes live horses, knights, pricnesses and all kinds of great fighting and Medeival Sports. When we arrived to the arena they assign you a color. Our knight was the Black and White knight. We entered with the rest of our cheering squad and the whole arena is divided into different color knights. I wish I could describe the experience, but you really just have to go.

The kids loved the show and the food and in the end, our knight won which Harbin thought was so awesome!!!
The mom.