Family Reunion...

We spent our weekend in Verona, Missouri at the McDonald family reunion. We had a really good time (except for the 16ish hours spent in the car between Friday and Sunday). Brian saw family that he hasn't seen in about 28 years, so it was really neat.
The reunion was at Brian's Uncle Rick's house. His place is a kid's dream (well, a kid without their mom chaperoning). He had a pond, good climbing trees, a golfcart to get around in, a motorized scooter, all kinds of fun stuff. It made me want to get out of my crazy neighborhood and get back into some wide open spaces!
Here are some pictures of our trip...

Addie Grace making dandelion wishes...

Sawyer just being cute...

Addie Grace being initiated into playing washer boards...

riding around in the golfcart...

my sweet boy...

I always try to get a cute picture of Jack and Sawyer together, however, they are verrry elusive, so here's little Jack. I don't know if you can see it, but he got bitten by a dog on the right side of his face...poor guy!

skipping rocks...

hanging out with Grandaddy...

in the tree...

Hope your weekend was great as well!!!

T-R-O-U-B-L-E!!

Okay, I might have my hands full with Mr. Sawyer McDonald...
I'll start by telling you about one night in Target, I was holding Sawyer standing by the end cap of the liquor aisle (not IN the liquor aisle, mind you), and I was waiting for Brian and Addie Grace to catch up with us. Well, I guess I was standing a little too close to the display (my back was to it) and Sawyer grabbed a bottle and it EXPLODED in the floor! Liquor and glass went EVERYWHERE!! Sheepishly, I just said, "oops, did we do that??" apologized repeatedly to the Target clerk and hightailed it out of there.
Or how I have to fish Littlest Petshop toys, carpet fuzz, no-telling-how-old-pieces-of-nasty-anythings that resemble something that just maybe was once meant for eating that he finds in his carseat, under the couch...I don't know where else on an hourly...minutely (is that a word?) basis. (I never really had that problem with Addie Grace).
And another adventure was at Aunt Carol's house. He was holding a bottle of finger nail polish, and from another room I hear, "oh no!" When I get to the living room, I see dark fingernail polish all over him and more importantly all over Aunt Carol's light beige carpet (I was a little too horrified to get a snapshot of that).
I could go on and on about my rotten little, eh, I mean precious little boy. I guess it's all pretty par for the course for an all-boy little boy, so I'm okay with all that, BUT NOW THIS????

We were sitting in the living room just hanging out.
I start doing other things, only glancing at Sawyer every few minutes to make sure all's well; he pretends to be angelic for my quick glances...
Walk out of the room, come back and he's ripped open his shirt to show his chest hair and he's hiding behind his toy basket SMOKING!!

WHAT'S A MOTHER TO DO?!?!?

(These pictures are not posed at all...seriously. Okay, maybe he didn't really tear open his shirt...it was open in the other pictures too, you just couldn't see it. I'm not even sure why I took the first two pictures in the first place, but that really was exactly how he was sitting when I came back into the room!! What in the world?? Crazy baby!!!)

In the tub...

I'm sure that you probably get sick of sappy pictures of my kids...but I just couldn't resist this one of Sawyer. This is one of his 9 month pictures. It's the only one that I have (she just happened to email it to me for something), so I don't have anymore to show, but I thought it was sweet and wanted to share.
Just for good measure, here's a bath picture of Addie Grace too (not a professional...just a snapshot, but I've always loved it).

Love those babies!!!
That's all I have! Have a good evening!

FOUR!!

How is it possible that my little girl is FOUR years old?!?!? It truly does make me sick! She is such a joy and I am so thankful that God blessed us with this little treasure...we truly are blessed beyond measure!!

Addie Grace a few days after coming home from the hospital... (there really is a body under there...)

one...

our little monkey at two...

at her tea party at three...(looking a little hunchy)

and this year...FOUR...such a big girl!

Disney!!!

I don't even know where to begin about our Disney trip! It truly was just wonderful! Other than Sunday, when we had to swim through the park due to record rainfalls in Orlando, the weather was perfect! The crowds were low, the kids were happy, so we were happy! It was so much fun!
I won't try to post many of my pictures here. I'm embarrassed to even say how many that I took. Brian said that I tried to record every 15 seconds spent in the park if that tells you anything!!
Saturday (our first day in the park) was Addie Grace's 4th birthday, so it was an extra special day for us. We had dinner in Cinderella's castle that night and it was so much fun! Addie Grace was at a really fun age to do Disney because everything truly was magical for her!
I have the urge to make this post obnoxiously long and to post all 10 million of my pictures, but I will spare you all of the sordid details and just give you a few of our highlights...

Addie Grace and Sawyer were very well behaved for most of our vacation until we ran into this alligator at Neverland...


Addie Grace took it upon herself to remedy the problem of Sawyer slowing us down...


I am happy to report that she was unsuccessful and that all 4 McDonald's were able to return home intact from vacation!

Gotta love those McCall's...

Before I go into my Disney post, I've got to brag on my sweet, wonderful, precious friends that were so great to us all last week! We had so much fun with them and spending time with them always makes me miss my silly college days!
I laughed til I cried at stupid stuff that no-one else in the world would laugh at, stayed up too late and was reminded once again how blessed and fortunate I am to have such wonderful friends.
One of my favorite things was getting to watch our kids and their kids friendship grow! Here are some pictures of them...I'm going to leave out pictures of me and Holly because I don't want you all to be jealous of how skinny and pretty we are...(unfortunately that knocks out pictures of Wiley and Sawyer, but they were really, really cute together...trust me!)

Addie Grace and Grady were really, really quiet, so Holly went looking for them. This is where she found them...

Princess Addie Grace and Prince Grady with their designer...

Grady didn't seem to mind getting a kiss...

Thanks guys...we miss you already!!

Two kids for sale...

Today at dance class, Addie Grace's teacher was holding Sawyer while I was filling out some paperwork. When I went to take him back, HE WOULDN'T COME TO ME!! He's only done that once before with my mom, and that was only because she was sneaking him bites of her ice cream. You should have seen the look on his little rotten face...little twerp!!
And even better, at breakfast this morning, Addie Grace disobeyed me about something, and I said, "there's going to be a punishment...I don't know what yet, I'm just going to have to think about it for a minute". She asked if I was going to ground her from Pepsi-Cola (Pepsi-Cola is her stuffed pug for those of you who don't know), and I said I'm not sure yet. Then she said..."I know! How about I'm grounded from YOU?!?!?" Big twerp!!
I'm definitely not feeling the love in the McDonald home today...

Looking for God...

As we were walking out of church Sunday morning, Addie Grace saw a flower and stopped to pick it. She said, "Mom, I'm going to pick this flower so that I can praise God." We got in the car and buckled her up and looking up and holding her flower up, she said, "God, this flower is for you because you were born. I'm going to give it to you." Pause...pause...pause...while slowly looking left, then right, then up, then down..."but God, I can't give it to you because I can't see your hands!!"

I love my little girl's precious heart...

Happy Easter!!

It's been a great Easter weekend! We went to Nashville yesterday to go to Addie Grace's friend Griffin's birthday party. Sunday we did Easter with my family (and celebrated Brian's birthday) and went to Mrs. Darlee's (a family friend) for an Easter egg hunt. It was great!!

We tried and tried to get a cute Easter picture of Sawyer and Addie Grace before church Sunday morning, however, they just WERE NOT having it! Sawyer has a new theme for most of his pictures...it's really funny...I'll have to dedicate a post just for that later! Anyway, here are some of our Easter pictures...

Checking out their loot!...


Addie Grace...


Sawyer...


One of 4000 crazy shots of them together...I'm not sure why they are leaned so far back in the chair...I've actually got a couple that are a little better, but I like the look on Sawyer's face in this one...


At the Easter egg hunt...



They gave Sawyer a golden egg (it even had money inside!) and he was happy for the rest of the hunt!




Hope that your Easter was great as well!!! Here are some more shots of the weekend...

Check out her moves...

Well, we did our first ballet and tap class!! It was alot of fun and Addie Grace LOVED it!! My only gripe is that it just runs with the school year and so we only have a few more classes left that we can go to, and they are all getting ready for their program, so Addie Grace is kind of odd man out. I really wish we would have started in September, but oh well, I didn't know about it then...we'll be ready next year!!
The website said that the girls had to wear their hair in a bun, so this morning was kind of challenging. Her hair is really fine, and so pretty much the only hairstyle that I'm able to do on her is the one that you always see...parted on the side, pulled back, bow, and we're good to go. Anyway, about thirty minutes and thirteen bobbypins later she had a resemblance of a bun. I started getting anxious wondering how in the world I would be able to pull that off each week. I considered enrolling in a cosmetology program, however when we got there, I was THRILLED to see that not all of the girls were wearing buns! Hallelujah!
Anyway, here are some pictures of our morning...

Look, No Hands!!

Look how proud Sawyer is for standing by himself! I was sitting at the computer and he was sitting in the floor and he pulled up on my chair and just let go! He only stood for about 3 seconds, but still, he was proud, and so was I!!
I took him to his room and stood him up to take these pictures. I tried to take the pen away, but he was not having it! I know, I know...he could have put his eye out, but I was watching him. Please don't call Child Protective Services on me. I then changed his clothes so I could take some pictures with him not wearing Christmas pajamas in March, but by then, he was done. I did get one shot, but he was starting to fall, so my hand is on his back. Anyway, here's my big boy...excuse the pen and the out of season clothing...

Just Hanging Out...

Well, I finally feel recuperated from our trip to Nashville. Our bags are finally all unpacked, the laundry is all done, and gummy snack and airhead wrappers don't fly out of my van doors anymore everytime you open them!
Not alot has been going on...just fighting with spring fever. We have alot of fun things coming up and I'm just ready to get on with them! Addie Grace starts a ballet and tap class tomorrow and we are so excited! I'm just nervous that she's going to try and 'teach' the teacher and correct the other girls for not doing their moves correctly! She's so funny!! This morning on the way to preschool, she wanted me to be sure to call today and get directions so that we would know exactly how to get there tomorrow. She also said, "Mom, you need to get me some new ballet shoes because I don't think that they will let me wear the ones that I wear here with my tutu...even though they certainly are cute"! Hopefully, I'll have some pictures of class tomorrow to share.
Well, I'm going to hop off of here. Here are some pictures of Addie Grace and Sawyer with their friends Shelby and Jonathan on a couple different playdates. Shelby and Addie Grace decided to dress up as princesses, and thanks to my friend Suzanne, Jonathan and Sawyer are dressed up as pimps...

9 Months Old!!!!

I can't believe that my baby is 9 months old today!!! He is so rotten but we are eating him up!!!

He still won't crawl...I really think he might walk first!! He has started pulling up on EVERYTHING, and then gets mad because he can't figure out how to get back down...I'll post some of his "stuck" pictures soon.

Aaaah Home!!

Well, we finally made it!! I was beginning to wonder if we were ever going to make it back to Indy!! We've been gone a week and a half, and I am glad to be home!! We played nanny in Newburgh with my neices for a few days while my sister was on a cruise, and then we went to Nashville and stayed while Brian went to California for work. We got to visit with lots of friends and got Sawyer's nine month pictures made, finally got to play in some snow (crazy that we had to go back to Nashville to do that...), and got to just hang out and enjoy being with family. It was great!!
I'm about to start unpacking (yuck!), and climb into my bed for a few hours. Addie Grace threw up on the way home and dealing with that and just being cooped up in the car has me beat. Just wanted to pop in and let you know we are alive!! I have more pictures of our adventures, but I'll mess with that later.