outside fun

Here are the pictures from last Monday when Presley and I played with my camera. I think they turned out really good considering they were some of the first I took! Hopefully they will get better! I took a ton of pictures trying to get a feel for what I'm doing, but I won't post them all! :)

I was trying to focus on her feet first, then in the picture below I focused on her face.

above is one of my favorites!

I told her to stop going back under the trees and this is the reaction I got! Ha ha!

even though we lost...

we still wore cute clothes for the night! ha ha! I knew our rebels would lose because they've been stinking all season. But a true fan sticks with their team! We went over to my parents' house tonight to eat dinner and watch the game!

Presley in her super long dress. Which pleases me because she'll be able to wear it longer!

Did y'all know that a cheerleader lived here? Ha ha!

Jaden was screaming "Go Rebels!"

and it was only fitting that the night end with these! ;)

Hope y'all had a great Saturday night!

Turkey day 2010!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone had a day full of good food and family surrounding them. I am so very thankful for the wonderful husband and daughter that I do NOT deserve. & my family and friends that make life so worthwhile! I am also incredibly thankful that God provides me with everything I need and more times than not, more than I could ever want for. He is SO faithful! =)

We had an amazing day full of fabulous food, fried turkey, and (almost) all of our family. My dad is at work but my brother Jonathan got to be with us! =) My grandparents came down to visit as well.

I laughed at his apron because he wasn't grilling! Maybe he needs one that says "King of the deep fryer"! Ha ha!

mmmmmm! My mouth is salivating again just looking at this picture!

The buffet...complete with a handprint turkey from Kole!

Pies! =)

Little Miss Cuteness!

This would have been a better pic if I had a tripod. Oh well!

Anticipate Christmas posts to start soon! :) I don't shop for black Friday unless there is something extremely worth getting out of bed for! & this year there wasn't! So we are going to get our tree tomorrow. I think we'll have to crank the air down and drink some hot cocoa to get in the Christmas spirit!

meet the newest member of our family...

MY NEW CAMERA!

Ha ha! LOVE....that's the best word for me to use! My sweet, wonderful husband bought it for my (early) birthday present. I've gotten some awesome pictures already and I haven't even finished the manual. Presley and I went outside Monday and took a whole bunch of pics. I'll post them later so you guys can see my awesome skills! Ha ha! I kid, I kid! :)

The 3 day birthday extravaganza!

Happy Birthday to the most wonderful husband & father around!
We love you!

So today is technically Jeremiah's birthday. But we do it BIG here in the P household and celebrate for 3 days! Ha ha, not really it's just the way things worked out! I took him out Saturday night to dinner while our friend Karri kept Presley. That was a present in itself because we hardly ever go anywhere by ourselves anymore! It was nice! We had to do it that night because the restaurant was closed Sunday night. (Most places are closed on Sundays here in Mayberry where we live! Ha ha!) On Sunday we went to my parents' and ate lunch and cut his cake. He's already gotten some gifts but not all of them, so I won't talk about them on here. I know he peruses the blog sometimes! We had to celebrate his birthday early because I work tonight and will only get to see him for about 15 minutes. :( It's ok though, we had a great time & we'll get a 4 day weekend this weekend to spend together. :) Yay!

Oh and I think I've mentioned this cake before.....white chocolate cream cheese with strawberry filing! Seriously to die for! Don't you love how Jeremiah turned 6? Ha ha! They were the only candles we had, so it had to do for turning 33!

Art at the Farm

Yesterday, Presley and I ventured out to Walnut Hill, which is pretty much at the FL/AL line. It was about an hour and a half drive, but really worth it because we went to Art at the Farm! It was out at (the photographer we used for Presley's 1st birthday) Abbie's parents' farm. There were a bunch of vendors that sold art, jewelry, books, etc. They also had some awesome catfish from David's Catfish House....which is like the best fish house ever! & a coffee vendor that sold chocolate dipped cheesecake on a stick. mmmmm, it was heaven! =) They also had pony rides and a bouncy thing for kids. I look forward to going again next year when Presley is a little bigger and can do more things. But we still had a great time!

I think a horse pulling a buggy was going by & Presley was making the car sound at it!
& below she was sitting on some painted place mats that were spread out on the ground.

This tulle wreath was the only thing I bought. I absolutely love it! I can't wait to hang it up on Friday! :)

& in no relation at all.....here is Sosa! My parents' new dog. The kids love her! They adopted her from RUFF in Ft. Walton Beach. I don't really know why the previous owners named her after a male baseball player, but my mom wants to change her name to Sophie. It kinda sounds similar and is more fitting for a girl. But who knows how that's going to go because all the kids already call her Sosa!

17 months!

Presley is now 17 months {and 1 day!} old! I can't believe how fast the time has flown by and that by the next month post, Presley will be 6 months away from turning TWO! It both scares and excites me!

Here are the new things that Presley's doing now.
*says "shhh" with one finger over her mouth
*finally knows what a dog says. this was a huge work in progress...she knew that a dinosaur roars for about a month before this. seriously!
*says nigh nigh when time for bed, and uoh....which is uh oh in case you didn't know that.
*if you mention that it's time for a diaper change, she will go lay down in the floor and pat her diaper! it's so stinkin' cute!
*gives hugs and kisses on command. it's one of my favorite things & makes her seem so grown up!
*shakes her head "no" when we ask her to go do something....gotta love that independence!
*puts her fingers in her ears like she doesn't want to listen to you talk. it's the funniest thing! she started it when we went to disney a few weeks ago and i just forgot to blog about it. who knows where she picked it up from!

Little Miss has finally transitioned to one nap during the day. She still sleeps from about 7:30-8 during the night. She has just recently gone to the one nap. I'm not sure if I like it or not. She seems to be so sleepy in the afternoon still. Maybe it's because nap is mostly around 11:30 or 12 & they still only last about 1.5-2 hours. Uggg, why can't children understand how awesome sleep is?

Everything else is pretty much the same as last month. No different news on eating habits, etc.

dress up day!

I'm beginning to think we should get Presley some dress up clothes for Christmas! This girl loves to put on wacky things and prance around the house in them! The hand me down coat from Kole was just hanging on her closet door because I hadn't gotten around to putting it up yet, but when Presley saw it, she had to wear it. That lasted until she was dripping with sweat, so I had to distract her and take it off! She sure was funny in it though! She was carrying around a ladybug and accidentally dropped it. When she tried to bend over and pick it up, she was so stiff in the coat that she fell over and couldn't get up! We both laughed so hard!

And of course, the tutus! She wanted to wear both of them today. & as you can see, they take up half of her little body! She kept bringing me books and trying to sit in my lap for me to read them to her, but it was a little crowded! Thank goodness this outfit didn't last but about 10 minutes!

lazy weekend

Whew! This weekend flew by! Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I only had 3 days off and I'm used to 4. But Saturday was glorious! We woke up with absolutely no plans in mind. The last time that happened was about 17 months ago! Ha! Jeremiah got up with Presley and he let me sleep in. He offers quite a bit to do this, but I feel so guilty because he always hurts so bad in the morning (he has rheumatoid arthritis) and has to wrestle with Presley 3 mornings out of the week anyway. But I decided to take him up on the offer and I think I finally got out of bed around 10.30! Again haven't done that but about twice in 17 months! We just bummed around, watched TV, & napped when Presley did. Glorious! We did go to my parents house and brought dinner over to them. We grilled hamburgers and I made the seriously awesome dip below.

It was so delish! It's just regular rotel dip with a spin. You add crumbled sausage and 1/2 a package of taco seasoning to a huge thing of velveeta and about 1 1/2 cans of rotel. Seriously awesome! =)

Today at church we had a "service on the lawn" to commemorate 27 years of saving lives! Kind of like a homecoming for you Baptist folks! They grilled hamburgers and hot dogs outside and had like 6 or 7 big bouncy things for the kids to play on. I was looking forward to seeing Jaden & Kole playing on them, but Presley had had enough after lunch. She was so hot and tired....so we just packed up and headed home. Where we all promptly napped again! (maybe that's why the weekend flew by! ha ha!) Of course no weekend would be complete without a trip to Walmart to get groceries. So that's what we did tonight. Not too terribly exciting but a pretty good weekend!

Here is a picture of Presley from last night. She was so cute in her glittery star shirt! But, I couldn't get a smile for anything!

Show Us Your Life- Bathrooms

I'm a day late, but I'm still going to post about it! :) Kelly's Korner is doing a "blog hop" so to speak, of bathrooms. Our master bath is AWFUL! I hate how small it is. It's literally as big as it looks in the pictures! We have definitely learned that in our "forever" home a big master bath is a must!

Ok, on to the decor. It's still the builder's beige, but I plan on painting it a shade or two lighter than the grey of our bedroom. I want to paint the cabinets white and do like a faux bead board with some awesome wall paper that I found. & then add some red accents. Maybe this will all get done before we move in a few years! ;)

My favorite thing! Jeremiah's dad painted it. Isn't he mucho talented? I had to practically BEG for him to give it up! It hangs above the toilet....which was the only wall with enough space to hang it.

Of course I had to have a monogrammed shower curtain! =)

Here is the guest/Presley's bath. I really love it! We painted and decorated this one about a month before I got pregnant with her. & I refused to redecorate again! I can't wait for a house with more bathrooms so she can finally have a kid-friendly one! But it works for now. I love the green! I saw it in ad for Lowe's. You know where they stage the perfect room in order for you to want and /or buy everything in it? I went that weekend and bought the paint! So I guess it worked on me! Ha!

This flower print is actually an x-ray of a dogwood flower. I fell in love with it and knew it would be perfect with the green paint on the walls.

Whew! This picture is crazy flashy! But I didn't have time to edit it. I want to change these cabinets too. Maybe I'll just get paintbrush happy with white soon!

tutu funny!

My cousin sent us a box of hand me down girl clothes for Presley. Well, in this box was a tutu that her little girl had. & Presley LOVES this thing! She has a blue tutu from her first birthday festivities, but apparently it's not as much fun. She will bring the new one to us and want it put on her no matter if she's wearing pajamas, regular clothes or just a diaper. It's the funniest thing to see her waddling around in it. She kind of reminds me of Jim Carrey in Ace Ventura when she wears it over her clothes! :) One day last week she was wearing the tutu and found my badge from work in my closet. Well, don't you know Presley had to wear that too! And it was just too hilarious not to take a picture of and remember. I'm sure that she'll love these when she's 16! Ha!

Safari Ride

The Safari ride was pretty awesome at Animal Kingdom. You get on this big jeep thing and take a drive through the African plains! It's probably the closest I'll ever get to a real safari so I enjoyed it!

Here was the first view as you pull out from the pavilion where they pick you up.

This tree's trunk holds thousands of gallons of water. I can't remember what it's called.

I think this a gazelle, but I could be wrong! It's hard to keep track of all of them after a while!

The huge dirt pile in the next picture is actually a termite mound. They were scattered all throughout the safari and they were huge. The driver, I mean tour guide, said they are hard as rocks.

Longhorn cattle. Look at how close we were! That is Jeremiah's hand. The tour guide said that their horns aren't heavy at all. They are actually hollow except for blood vessels.

My favorite......a giraffe!

An elephant who was putting on some sunscreen....throwing dirt on its back. They can burn as easily as we can from the sun!

Young flamingos that are still mostly white. Apparently when they around 2 years old they have eaten enough shrimp to get their famous pink color.

A lion who was taking it easy in the shade!