July!

Well what used to be my weekly blog posts are now apparently monthly, but that just means we are busy having fun and enjoying the summer.

We kicked off July with a super duper 2 week visit from the Gosline's (minus Uncle Ed who is in Afghanistan). God Bless you Edward!

We did some fun family things like a day on the lake with a rental pontoon and 6 cousins all 6 and under, a trip to Carowinds, and Cooper's 1st bday party.

We had a great group of friends and family over to celebrate Cooper. Everyone enjoyed being together and having Carla, Grace and Coop in NC.

Ed's Mom, Nancy (Cooper's Grandma) even drove all the way from VA Beach. Now that's an awesome Grandma! And look how proud Mama Carla is of her baby boy.

Carla's bestest friend ever, Angie, never misses a family function and we are so lucky to have her and her family in our lives. They are so fun and just like family to all of us.

Angie's son, Matthew (AKA Ben's lil bro) is a natural with Buxton:

We made a quick trip to the mountains for our usual July 4th celebration. This was the first time it rained that I can remember in the many years I've gone there for the 4th. The golf course picnic was moved to the clubhouse in Hound Ears but we still got to do the duck race and of course see the awesome fire works!

Grace picked out this matching dress for Elin and brought it as a gift when they came to NC. How sweet are these 2 girls! I think they are going to have quite a bond as they grow up.

Family pic time:

Check out Buxton's face. And Mom looking at Buxton like he's being ridiculous (which he was):

Now Mom is looking at Bill with a smile....maybe she's thinking "we better marry soon or else Bill may decide this family of mine is too much". They are getting married on August 20!

Oh how I already miss my sweet sweet niece!

Serious:

Happy...now that's more like it!

lately

elin started daycare last week and besides not napping, she's done really well. seems like she really likes all the new toys and kids to "play" with. all the excitement is probably why she's not really sleeping there but we are hoping that she will adjust and start to get more rest there during the day.

elin and buxton are both at first pres of belmont and their rooms are right next door to each for now. buxton loves knowing that his lil sis is at his school and is so proud when he goes in her room.

the wagon has been fun for the kids. elin is in a bumbo but her "bum" is almost too big for it.

had to post these funny faces:

2 big milestones recently for baby girl: 1. saying "dada" 2. almost crawling, not quite but almost

and a few of my recent favorites of my little muffin:

Kiawah -Memorial Day

I have no excuses for being so far behind in blogging, but better late than never. We went to Kiawah over Memorial Day weekend. Just us 4, for 4 days. It was really awesome and we thoroughly enjoyed this precious time together.

Kiawah is known for the bike paths, so we took full advantage of those even though our baby girl was still a wee bit small for the bike seat. She loved it though, and Buxton loved the bike riding almost as much as he loved the beach.

Elin thought the sand, sun, and ocean breeze was pretty great too!

This shovel barely left Buxton's hand while we were on the beach. Many holes were dug and many sand castles built. I could barely get him to stop to drink some juice or eat something.

Luckily Elin was very happy to nap on the beach in the Bob.

And here are just a few more of our time there:

Buxton playing with his shadow:

my muffin on mother's day

elin is now 7 months old and her personality is really showing. she rarely stops moving and i'm a little scared she has her brother's energy. she's still really easy, sleeping well and without a fuss. but i see them both giving us a run for the money when she becomes mobile.

i took these pics on mothers day and tried to post them last week but blogger was down.

i hope to be back soon with some pics i took friday of sweet vivian webster.

TN and Easter

We took a little vacation to Pigeon Forge/Gatlinburg, TN with Ben's family for some much needed QT. The main reason for our time together was to be with Ed, our brother-in-law, since he's being deployed to Afghanistan for the next year. Ed is such an amazing husband, father, brother, uncle and an all around great guy. Here he is with his and Carla's 9 month old son, cutie-pie Cooper. We are going to miss you Edward!! And we will be praying for your quick and safe return home. Disney 2012...it's on!!

All the cousins that were on the trip, minus Elin who was sleeping:

These were on the tram in Gatlinburg. When Grace first came home (from Russia) at 18 months old she wore 6-12 month size clothes. Elin is now wearing some of Grace's 1st clothes, at 6 months. It blows us away to think about how teeny tiny Grace was at 18 months. She still has a teeny waist but loooong legs and she is so smart. She is reading on a 3rd grade level and is in Kindergarten. She's also so happy to finally have a girl cousin to play with.

We were so busy during our trip that I didn't take many pics. I also had a very low camera battery and no charger. But this next set is from our stop at Biltmore on our way home. We had a very short visit and it was pouring rain when we arrived. But when the sun came out it was fabulous. All of the pics we took at the house gardens are on Ben's phone, but I brought my camera when we went to Antler Hill Village for lunch.

My battery died right before we went to the barn to pet all the farm animals but the 3 day old baby goats we saw were suuuuuper cute. The bunny rabbit, goats, chickens, turkins, horse and sheep were pretty impressive too. I'm very jealous of the Grant and Lowrance families who live so much closer and can visit this awesome place more often. In fact it was Sunday's tulip post that gave me the great idea to visit Biltmore in the first place. I'm a sucker for hundreds of beautiful tulips. Of course as we were walking through the gardens I was telling Ben all about how we needed this plant and that plant, and how I was going to plant hundreds of tulips in our yard this Fall. You know, with all the free time we have these days.

During the 30 minutes we had to kill after church on Sunday, while we waited for our favorite restaurant to open for brunch, we had a mini-photo session at a nearby school. Bobby's Alma Mater (Gaston Day), actually.

Ben put an Azalea flower above Elin's ear and I just love this picture.

Elin is still an amazingly easy baby who is always happy. She smiles for anybody and everybody and never gets upset when she's left in the church nursery or with her daytime sitters. She'll start at Buxton's school in June and I have a feeling she will love it since she gets so excited when we go "visit" to pick Buxton up. And she officially has her 1st tooth! The Doc said it was coming at 4 months, and we had all the drooly, poopy, snotty symptoms to go with it for the last 2 months. Finally the first bud appeared and thanks be to God for Elin being tougher than her brother at this stage. And Amen for girl power!

Buxton is really into jumping off everything these days.

He's into a lot of other things that I shouldn't write about that go right along with the "terrible 2s". But with every difficult moment he challenges us with, God's Grace with this sweet muffin overcomes it.

I'm also thankful for God's Grace in keeping my sweet Zion alive and well for the last 12 years. I've made a vow to myself to spend more time with him and give him more attention each day. I know I didn't really need to share that but it's one of those things, if you say it out loud/say it to others, it's more likely to happen.