Look at all those cuties! These are the 5 great grandchildren of Joyce and Paul Daugherty. (my dad's parents) From Left to right: Ellis 2 months, Colin 5, Jane 3 (almost), Dylan 2 (almost) and Atlas 1. This was the first time all 5 of them were together! It's pretty special that a trip to Austin is all it takes to get them all together. Jane adores our trips to Austin! She gets SO excited when I tell her we're going on a trip.
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| Pappaw and his newest Granddaughter! |
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| I finally got to meet my first niece!! |
I planned to meet this cutie a week after she was born, but sickness and other plans kept me from getting to come see her until she was over a month old. But look!! I finally got to meet my little niece, Ellis! She's adorable and way worth the wait. :) You can tell I was really enjoying the sweet newborn snuggles! Someone asked me if holding her made me want another one. I said that I knew I already wanted another one, but it didn't make me wish I had another newborn right now. ;) I'm very happy with my two kiddos and their current ages. Plus this was the same weekend we were picking up our puppy! (more on that later.)
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| Wheeee!! |
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| Chillin with Pappaw on the saucer swing |
Once we all got in a few baby snuggles, we decided the older kiddos would benefit from a walk to the park to play and get out that cooped up car energy. Just about every time we visit Austin we walk to this park. It's pretty awesome and a perfect walking distance from Scott and Anna's house. These swings are always a favorite! Every park should have some of these saucer swings! It's really fun to look back through the pictures of our visits to this park and see how Jane has grown.
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| Making friends |
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| Jane wanted to catch us |
Slide time! I love that Jane makes friends everywhere she goes. She made friends with a little girl and they took turns going down the slide and catching each other for a while! Of course, because of she's 3, fights follow pretty quickly after new friendships. But they always seem to make up fast and move on like nothing happened. I think I could learn a few things from Jane about friendship and forgiveness. I love that God teaches us life lessons through our children while we are teaching them about life as well.
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| Playing with cousin Ellis |
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| Atlas wanted to say hi too! |
Look at those sweet cousins! It makes me so happy to see these little ones start to interact together. I love that Jane and Atlas take such an interest in her. I had been asking Scott and Anna when we were going to get a cousin from them for about 3 years. ;) You can imagine how excited I was to find out they were pregnant and of course how thrilled I was when she arrived to the world! I look forward to these cousins growing up together and having many fun cousin times!
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| Evening concert in the park |
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| Excited concert goer |
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| Yay family! |
Scott and Anna said there was going to be a concert at their local park. We decided it would be fun to check it out. Atlas and Jane had never been to a concert before. Jane LOVED it! I wasn't surprised. It's everything she loves, music, dancing, loudness and everyone being excited with her. She danced almost the whole time! The music sounded like 90s combined with current electronic music. Jane really enjoyed it. I think I have a concert goer on my hands. I took her down to the concrete stage right next to the speakers and Jane didn't mind the loudness at all! My little thrill seeker. Atlas was somewhat indifferent. But he bobbed around to a few songs. :)
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| hanging out with my second born |
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| Marmee and Ellis! |
We always end up enjoying some relaxing porch time when we visit Scott and Anna. Great chats and snacks. The kids like to run around on the sidewalk in front of the house. Sometimes Atlas wants to snuggle instead. I try to soak it all up because he'll outgrow it before I know it! Now we get to add Ellis snuggles to our porch time. It's pretty great. :)
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| 2nd Cousin friends! |
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| Buddies |
My cousin owns a coffee shop in Austin called Bennu Coffee. Their second location was having their grand opening while we were visiting that weekend! So we had to stop by and check it out! Both locations are pretty cool. Check them out
here! My cousin was able to swing by the shop with her kiddos while we were having some breakfast and coffee. As you can see by the look on Jane's face, she was pretty excited to see cousin Colin! Colin and Jane have a special relationship. They are both very emotional people so they can have pretty big fights, but they always have so much fun together and love to play together. I think I have a picture of them wrestling almost every time they've been together. ;)
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| Uncle Scott helping Jane climb |
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| So sweet! |
Unfortunately our Austin visit was coming to a close. We decided to walk to a local park as our last activity before we hit the road! Getting all that toddler energy out before a long car ride is always a good idea. Jane is pretty adventurous at parks and Uncle Scott is always ready to lend a helping hand when things get a little hard/high/dangerous. Scott has always been great with my kids so I knew he was going to be an amazing dad! It's so sweet to get see him with his daughter now. He's just as great as I knew he would be. Ellis is pretty lucky to have Scott and Anna as parents. And we're pretty lucky to have them as Aunt and Uncle. :)
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| First picture of Marmee and Pappaw with all three of their grandchildren! |
While we're on the subject of being blessed with great family. Let's talk about these two for a minute. I can't say enough about how helpful and loving they are to me. From babysitting to taking care of my yard to sharing their pool to Thursday and Sunday dinners and just overall support to our little family. They are amazing. I know some may feel that 5 minutes is too close for parents to live to their grown children. But it has worked out splendidly for us the last 3 years. I have no doubt that it will continue. We love you Marmee and Pappaw! Thank you for everything!!!
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| Sleepy kids! |
Looks like our park before heading home idea worked flawlessly! This was the first time they BOTH slept all the way home from Austin. All 2 1/2+ hours. Woohoo!! Another fun trip to Austin is in the books. I have a feeling they're going to get more and more fun as the cousins get older. :)
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| Sleepy boy while mom works. |
Let me back up a couple weeks and tell you about how I got a new job! Sometime in March my oil and gas accounting job started really slowing down! Plus my boss who had hired me at that company and who gave me lots of projects to keep me busy moved on to a new company. My hours were pretty low and I needed to find something else to pick up the slack. Within the week my brother called me and told me the company he works for needed someone to do some part time accounting! So he put in a word for me with his boss and I sent in my resume. I had a quick phone interview and he told me I could start with ChurchBiz in a couple of months when a couple more clients would be coming on! So I started around the end of April with ChurchBiz. We do accounting and HR for churches and non-profits. It's really awesome because I'm salary! So whenever I get my work done I'm finished for the day and I am rewarded for being efficient! It's so nice not to have to log hours and take a small break whenever a potty training 3 year old needs help or I need to take out the house training puppy real quick! Another thing that makes working at ChurchBiz fun is that almost 10 years after Scott and I worked at Camp Tejas together we are working for the same company again. Take a look at their info page! So cool.
http://www.churchbizsupport.com/company.html It's pretty perfect!! God is so good!
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| Meeting Puppy! |
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| Such a cutie! |
LOOOOOOK! We got a puppy! I know, I know, call us crazy for getting a puppy when we have two toddlers running around! But Sam has been wanting a dog since we got married. I love dogs, so of course, I wanted one too. I just didn't want to have a dog in an apartment. So I told him we should wait until we had a house of our own and I could stay home and train the puppy. Once we had bought a house Jane was just three months old and I was still getting used to being a mother! So puppy was placed on hold again. Before we could consider a puppy again I was pregnant with Atlas when Jane was a year old. So finally this past February Atlas turned one (and I wasn't pregnant!) and we were tossing the idea of getting a puppy around, but realized we had to get our back fence and gate fixed before we could get a dog. We got a great tax refund on our return this year which allowed us to get the backyard dog ready! So within a month we put a deposit down and then picked up our puppy just a couple weeks later!
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| 7 weeks old |
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| 3 1/2 months old |
Welcome home Cambria! Yes, she's named after the band Coheed and Cambria.(Sam's favorite band) Sam told me he wanted to name his next dog Cambria before we were even started dating. So her name was pretty much decided around 7 years ago. ;) She is growing soooo fast! I think she's heavier than Jane already. One of the biggest reasons we got a lab is that they are amazing family dogs. Also Sam had a lab growing up and she was wonderful. We love her chocolate color. We decided on chocolate because we mostly wear dark clothing and all of our flooring would blend pretty well with her hair. ;) She's beautiful and nearly everyone who sees her comments on how pretty she is.
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| Her color and coat are gorgeous |
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| This is why we got a lab |
That picture! It's the "I love you so I'll let you do this but can we please stop soon??" lab look. Jane and Cambria love to wrestle! It's ending more and more with laughing and less with crying because the dog bit her (because Jane was being to rough). The kids adore her(we do too!) and she adores them. The breeder told us she was the most social and attention needy puppy of the litter and she wasn't kidding. But we really love her personality and once she calms down a little and learns a some more, we know she's going to be an awesome dog. She is learning fast, but it's a challenge, of course. I'm really looking forward to her learning not to nip/bite, stop jumping up so much and of course be house trained!
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| Bringing her presents to the present table |
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| Kicking the ball around with Uncle Scott |
Our last Spring Adventure was Jane's 3rd Birthday party! Jane's birthday is always my sign that summer is upon us! Around the same time every year the pool water finally warms up to be comfortable to swim in without a wetsuit! ;) Perfect for a pool party! I think I'll keep having Birthday pool parties for Jane until she's old enough to tell me she's tired of it! It's so easy and fun. Access to a house to escape the heat if needed, a place to store and cook food and it's just 5 minutes from my house. :) Also I've always done pool parties so far because Jane LOVES to swim! Her love and skill for swimming definitely grows every year! She can swim by herself as long as she stays near the side and she can swim and float on her back now.
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| Testing out the water |
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| Birthday Pool Party Dance |
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| Me and my birthday girl! |
That swimsuit! I love it! We went to Toy's R Us just a few days before Jane's birthday party for some party stuff and to pick out a birthday swimsuit for her. Jane picked it out all on her own and it turned out it was on clearance. Score! I already have a thrifty shopper! ;) Oh and did I mention the pig tails... cuteness overload! I have a hard time getting Jane to even let me brush her hair, let alone put it up. Add sitting long enough for me to do two ponytails? Well, let's just say it doesn't happen often, but when it does I just adore it!
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| The kiddos enjoying the pool |
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| Jane and her neighbor friend Whisper |
Jane really enjoyed swimming with her friends. It's so much fun that she is starting to make her own friends. This was the first year she could tell me there were people she wanted to invite! I love that she is getting old enough to have input into her parties. She was super excited about having a pool party, who was coming to her party and that we were having pizza and ice cream cake! All choices expressly approved by Jane. :)
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| Present Time! |
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| Enlisting help from friends! |
It's pretty safe to say Jane is a professional present opener now. After she had opened a few presents on her own, she had her friends Brianna and Nicole help her take the paper to the trash can and help her open a few presents. She even leaned back on her arm while she watched Brianna open one for her. She's such a professional she promoted herself to supervisor! 😂 So funny! She loves all her presents. Thank you everyone!!
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| Extra Sprinkles! |
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| Cake Time! |
This was the first birthday party I didn't make homemade cupcakes for. Jane only eats the icing off of cupcakes and leave the rest. She does love ice cream though. So I thought an ice cream cake might be a hit! It sure was! She ate her whole piece and for the first time I didn't have any left over cake and every one got a piece. It was perfect. We might do this again!
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| Happy Birthday to Jane!! |
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| I think Atlas wants some cake too! |
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| Yummy!!! |
When Jane saw these pictures while I was writing this post she gasped and said "That my party!!" "Please may I go there?" I think it's safe to say she has some pretty good memories of the party. She's a pretty big fan of any party really. I asked her recently how old I was and she said, "2! Happy Birthday Mom! I come to your party??" Adorable. I told her about her birthday party 2 months beforehand. So the whole 2 months leading up to her party Jane would tell everyone, "My party is 2 months away!!" Even when it was only a week away. ;)
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| Atlas playing with Great Papa |
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| Can't get enough of the pool! |
Brianna, Jane and Nicole got back in the pool after cake and swam some more together. None of them wanted to get out! They are all little fish! We are so grateful to be able to celebrate Jane's 3rd birthday with such wonderful friends and family. She had a blast. I think it was her best birthday yet! :) Mission: Third Birthday Party = Success!
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| Siblings and friends |
That concludes our Spring Adventures of 2017. Like every season, it had its challenges, but we had so much fun! This summer is looking pretty great so far too. It makes my heart soar to see these two becoming such good friends. I'm really enjoying watching them grow up together.
YES! DONE! I have written this whole post twice. It's definitely not exactly the same as the original post, but I feel like this one might be even better. :)
Ephesians 6:1-4
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise— “so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.”
Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.
