Pretty-girl shoes

Hannah loves shoes. Anyone's shoes. She'll tromp around the house in Grandpa's shoes, Daddy's boots, Eli's sandals, or my clogs, etc. I was going through a bag of hand-me-downs the other day and found these adorable little shoes I'd forgotten about. As soon as they were in sight Hannah wanted them on. Poor little soul can barely stuff her feet into them, but oh how she loves wearing them around the house now! For the sake of her sweet toes, they'll have to just "disappear" in the quiet of the night sometime, but for a couple days it's perfectly fine to just enjoy! Aren't they adorable??

my beautiful little girl!

Hannah's birthday party!

The birthday girl.

The presents.

We really don't need a bunch of new toys around here, so Hannah mostly got clothes and books from everyone (wonderful!). And we got her a little tea party set, bath robe (since Eli had one and she didn't), $1 pair of sunglasses (she LOVES wearing glasses around), hat, books, a set of these colored pencils, her own toddler pair of scissors (since she keeps wanting to cut too when we're doing crafts), and an outside folding chair (again since Eli had one and she didn't and I never could find one for her last spring). And Eli picked out a $5 little cell phone for her (with my help) since little phones are her favorite!

Eli really wanted to over-help Hannah with her presents.
look at that sweet girl!tea partyEli really got into it!

Hers and his. Isn't her chair adorable? JoAnn Fabrics. Who knew?
The food.
Menu: pulled pork sandwiches, baby carrots, jello salad, and chips. (and a little snitch there at the end, haha. Love it though because it's so true to life!)Hannah set her new little chair right at the food table. Ready to eat!

The entertainment.

The kids had fun throwing balloons up at the taped one, trying to knock it down.

The cake.
I made it. No specific design or anything this time. Just a quick free-handed picture. Guests had already arrived before I had really even started decorating, so I had to make it quick!blowing out candles

The guests.

I didn't get a good picture of everyone, but we basically just had Kevin's parents, Nannie, and Aunt Sheila, and then my parents. We keep our parties simple.

And that was our day! Nothing extravagant. That's how we like it. Family came around 10:30am, presents n such started at 11, and kids went down for nap at 2pm. Family stayed 'til 4:30pm. And overall we just had a fun day celebrating the life of sweet Hannah, because after all isn't that what birthdays are all about!

We did presents first this time because last time at Eli's birthday he opened presents after lunch and right before cake and he therefore wasn't interested in cake and it seemed like he was just getting started on his toys and we had to send him off to nap. So this worked nicely to let Hannah enjoy her new things throughout the party, especially as we were still getting lunch out and ready. Aside from being crazy tired that day, we had a great day!

I see the future.

With this picture I see Hannah in the future was she's 13, laying on her bed writing in her diary with her leg up over her knee just as in this picture. Too cute.

Dress up.

I was cleaning out the closet in the playroom yesterday where we keep miscellaneous everything, and I finally thought to sort through our big hat/glove basket and separate all the kids' fun hats and put them in Hannah's empy diaper stacker baggie thingy she has hanging in her room just because it's pretty, finally giving it a real purpose. But after I did that, of course it was just all the regular stocking hats and scarves the kids wanted to play with. They sure had fun though!

We even got Carter in on the fun! Look at the sweet sweet face! Melts my heart!

5 weeks.

I'll get pictures and details of Hannah's birthday posted here soon, but since I know it'll probably take quite awhile to go through the pics and get them loaded to Blogger, I keep avoiding it. So for now I'll stick with the quick posts, just to keep your fill of baby love!

Look at how strong Carter is!

Friday play date

Last week we had a friend of mine and her four kids over for a play date and picnic lunch. We had lots of fun, and look how cute the older kids are having their lunch on the living room floor!

We soooo can't wait for spring and picnics outside, but for now, this'll do!

Carter--1 month

I have quite a few pictures I haven't had a chance to post, simply because I just haven't had time (imagine that!!). But we'll skip ahead to today's 1-month pictures! I can't believe it's been a month already, and at the same time it feels like Carter's been a part of our family for forever now! We sure do love him!

He still sleeps a lot but he's starting to be awake and adorably alert for a short while after each feeding. He likes being swaddled, falling asleep to the sound of ocean waves in our office room but we only do that once or twice a day. Otherwise he either naps on the couch, in his bouncy seat, or with us in the afternoon. He sleeps in our bed with us at night, in our desperation to get as much asleep as possible. He eats about every 3 hours, night and day and would perhaps be classified as a gassy baby. We tried a bottle with him for the first time a couple days ago, and he took it! But we haven't used it again since. Yet. He's very strong and can hold his head up well now. We don't really do tummy time very much though because his alert time is usually right after he ate and being on his tummy would probably cause him to spit up. He dislikes diaper changes and going in the car seat, but as soon we get going he calms right down. He's a relatively easy baby, but still a baby and therefore requires of a lot of work and attention. He's so worth it though and we're excited to watch him grow and develop!

Look who's 2!

Happy birthday, Hannah!

3 weeks old!

And sweet as ever.

It's been awhile since I've posted pics since I've been napping most afternoons instead of going through pictures on the computer. I can't believe Carter's three weeks old already and will be one MONTH old next week! Wowzers! Time is already flying!