Georgia Grace's 2nd Birthday Party

This year for Georgia Grace's birthday party we went more simple and low key. It proved to be just as fun and helped keep this super busy mom's sanity. I wanted it to be a fun day for her above all!

 

We had PERFECT weather. It was in the 70's at party time. October birthdays are tricky but so far she has had two great outdoor parties.

 

We did a pumpkin patch theme last year so this year it was more of a fall festival. We had a bouncy house, apple bobbing and a duck pond that actually turned out to just be water tables for the littles ha! There was something for every age.

 

Pink and orange were the main colors with a few accents that I used that were on the invitations. I pretty much just used the invitation (which I thought were so adorable! They were an etsy find) as inspiration for the decorations. I was happy with the final product (Thanks to my mom, mamaws and friend Sophie for help with some of the crafty things!)

 

The party was from 3-5 so we just did finger foods, drinks and cake. My mamaw made her wonderful pimento cheese and we had a fruit and veggie tray because my dietitian side had to come out :) (I wanted to serve milk in one of the drink dispensers and Marcus informed me I was wasting my time ha!)

 

I just used a few baskets we had in storage to hold our paper and plastic products.

 

 

My mother-in-law made adorable fruit and veggie platters with pumpkins as the dip holder! I love what it added to the table.

 

Apple juice, lemonade and water for the babes; coffee option for the adults.

 

My favorite part was the birthday cake. My boss's wife Gina made it for us and it couldn't have been more perfect. I wanted to continue with the simple theme with a special touch and she did just that!

And it tasted as good as it looked. Love love love!

For party favors my friend Alex Trabue made some super cute iced cookies. She also used the invitation as inspiration and coordinated them perfectly!

They were a big hit and made party favors super easy for me.

We had a duck pond (turned splash pool/water table ha!)..

And apple bobbing. The bigger kids enjoyed this more.

And what's a party without the birthday girl?!? She was all smiles. She loves a good party, especially if it's her own :)

 

The birthday beauty checking out her party guests arriving. I found a cute personalized pumpkin dress on Etsy for her to wear and she wore her cowboy boots and a bow of course. She was ready to party!

The bouncy house was the main attraction and even took a tumble when things got rowdy. Sweet Kypton was headed for safety ha! (Everyone was fine, it just leaned to one side and then the other until we could get the air back connected)

We had all the food and some tables and chairs sat up in our detached garage which by the way I am going to love having for entertaining! We just have to keep it clean and not fill it with junk :) As I mentioned the weather was awesome so some people stayed outside. We had haybales to sit on and some just brought their lawn chairs.

 

Birthday girl was doing flips before the end of the party! She loved it and her white-turned-black socks were proof.

 

Even the "big kids" got to jump-she played ring around the rosie with Aunt Paigey, Uncle Eric and Sophie once everybody had left.

Georgia Grace opened her gifts like a boss. She wanted to remove every little piece of paper from the package. And then she personally thanked the gift giver by name. I know I'm biased but it was the most precious thing! I was a proud mommy.

Piece by piece.....:)

She made it through every gift before running away!

 

Her friend Aiden gave her money in a balloon and he showed us how to open it with a fork ha! It was a crowd pleaser.

Everybody knows how much she loves Frozen so she got a lot of pieces to add  to her collection.

Frozen frenzy!

She opened a cherry chair from the Givens's that Chris had made her with wood that was left in our garage by the previous owners. Such a thoughtful gift! And he's been working for us at our house every night so I don't know how he found the time, he amazes me!

 

And then it was time to blow out the candles! Seeing "2" on top of the cake just doesn't seem possible. The fastest, sweetest, most fun two years of our lives no doubt.

 

Time to eat cake!

 

Then it was time for her gift from Mommy and Daddy...

a powered riding toy!

 

It's a Mercedes SUV I found on target.com. We knew we wanted a two seater so she could haul brother/sister around and this was our favorite one we found.

Once she learned how to push the gas she took off and made lap after lap! Initially she just pressed the gas, laid back and waved at everyone :) The steering wheel was just an optional thing.

But then she decided it would be a good idea to steer too. And flash adorable grins at everyone.

 

My favorite picture from the day. This captures her personality perfectly.

 I didn't think it through when I put her in a dress for her party that involved a bouncy house ha! Oh well she's far from modest and didn't let a little panty flashing slow her down.

 

It was such a fun day. I was able to enjoy the party more this year and watch her interact with her friends and have fun. It was a sweet celebration for our sweet baby girl!

Thanks again to all our family and friends who came and made the day extra special. It means more than you'll ever know!

 

Weekend

What a fun weekend we have had! It was so much fun I haven't found the time to upload all of my party pictures so just a brief update today and a full party post this week. She had so much fun at her party, we couldn't have asked for a better day or people to share the day with!

 

Friday night we got the weekend started with a hayride at the "twin's" house. Erica and Kypton are fellow AKK buddies and they have been so sweet to "baby Georgia". I think she will always be baby Georgia to them :) We had a great time visiting with friends and getting a break from house updates. I'm so glad they invited us. 

 

Saturday we headed to Lexington for a great SEC matchup. The undefeated #1 in the nation Miss. State Bulldogs came to town and we were hoping to see a big upset or at least a good game :) We met our friend Pat and his wife and tailgated with them for a bit before the game. She is 8 months pregnant so we had lots of baby talk. It was a perfect fall day for football.

 

We bought the tickets long before we knew we would be buying and updating a house right now ha! But I'm still glad we took the day to have fun. We had to sell our Keeneland tickets since it ended up being a day game which was a bummer but CBS picked up the game so that was good.

 

We had awesome seats right by the UK tunnel. It was such an exciting game from start to finish. Even though we didn't win I was a proud fan. The stadium was packed and it was such a great atmosphere.

 

And then Sunday was the big day! We chose to have her party on a Sunday this year because everyone seems to be less busy on Sundays than Saturdays (at least that's the case for us). She had lots of sweet family and friends that came and I'm so thankful for all of them. It means so much to know how many people love your baby. She embraced all aspects of partying this year-opening gifts (and personally thanking each person ha!), jumping in the bouncy house, blowing out the candles. I was so proud of my almost two year old. Her maturity was very evident. More pictures to come!

 

Happy Monday! We celebrate her actual birthday this week and then we are off to the beach. And hopefully when we return we will be ready to move in to our new house. We are busy but blessed.

Friday Favorites

We've had another busy week coordinating house projects, party prepping and furniture shopping. This week:

 

• The house is getting completely painted. So far we love every room!
• We finished the gravel in the landscape
• The carpet in the upstairs bedrooms is being installed today
• We bought our bedroom furniture!
• We finally chose our granite slab and it will be installed next week
• We picked out the hardwood for the upstairs hallway and our master closet. We couldn't get our identical wood until December so we compromised with a style that is very similar.
• New appliances are being delivered today!

Here is a sneak peek at our front entry. You can see we have put moulding in the entry, Marcus' study (left) and dining room (right). The entry is completely finished with paint so you can get an idea of what the main living areas will look like. More on paint colors soon :)

 

And here is our new king bed! We had almost bought a bedroom set at another furniture store but we just didn't pull the trigger on it. I had reservations. We went to Sprintz in Nashville to look at sofas and sectionals when I saw this and fell in love. Marcus instantly did too. He wanted panels, I wanted some curvature. Marcus requested once we had a house big enough that we have a king size bed. We have slept in a full size bed for five years now and he's ready for the upgrade! I am too. Can't wait to crawl into it!!

 

Two very random things that I wanted to note. I decided to start Georgia Grace on a children's vitamin. I grew up taking them and was an overall healthy child so I thought it would be a good addition to her diet. And since I'm still having an issue swallowing my prenatal vitamin some mornings I bought myself some too for those days it's the only option. She LOVES them and we say everytime we give one to her "one a day" so now she says that :)

 

And just a sweet picture to end the week on. This is how I feel after a long, tiring week! But no rest for the weary. We have a big weekend full of hayrides, a trip to Lexington for the UK game and the big birthday bash!!

 

See you Monday!

Monday Catch Up

Every October seems to be jam packed busy for us. The next two weeks are full to the brim and the next two Saturdays we will be out of town so we had a working Saturday. A working Friday and Saturday, and Sunday was all about choosing paint colors. We are eager to enjoy the fruits of our labor someday very soon! 

We do have an extra pair of hands helping us around the house. Her specialty has been riding in wheel barrows, strolling appliance manuals all over the kitchen floor and writing on the door and wall with a pen and highlighter. :/ It's a good thing we are getting new paint this week!

 

Moulding started going up this weekend. We will have it in the entry, dining room and study. I'm so thankful for family and friends who can do this for us. They are saving us a fortune and doing an excellent job!
 

Gravel for the landscaping was delivered Saturday. And it appears 10 1/2 ton will only get us about half of what we need. Unbelievable! Our landscaping is huge. I'm glad we are spending more money now to save in the future. And low maintenance is the name of the game!
 

I have to brag on my Papaw for just a second. What other 76 year old do you know that cuts down trees and splits wood all in a days work? He did this on Saturday. He is ironman! He splits and sells wood and raises cattle now that he is retired. I bet he could work circles around most 30 year old men! I'm proud of him.

In the midst of remodeling the house I found a free minute to take my first official belly bump picture. I was 15 weeks on Wednesday so I'm almost 16 now. Also, it's very appropriate I am wearing yoga pants and a maternity tshirt in my first bump pic since that's what you can find me in the second I get home each day. Notice my dirty shins from sitting on the floor measuring for moulding. It will all be worth to have a new, bigger home to bring this sweet baby home to.
 

I mentioned we were working on paint colors this weekend. We had a hard time making choices and I would still say a few rooms are subject to change but we had help from our good friend Sarah on our common living area paint color. This is her beautiful home-doesn't it look straight out of Pottery Barn? She has shared all her paint colors with me and we are going to use this color as our main color. It is "Bamboo" by Porter Paints. I'll do a full post devoted to paint soon.

 

This week we went to a cross-country meet to support some of Marcus's students and my old runners. It was a perfect afternoon for it, a little cool but sunny. She loved watching the runners and says she wants to be a runner someday. Mommy sure hopes so!

Our cousin Keagen celebrated his 10th birthday this weekend with a basketball party at the gym. GGH was the only girl at the party under the age of 16 :) She was in her comfort zone though surrounded by boys and attention.
 

I put her in a MJ dress and she just looked so big in it. Back to the smocking and onesie pajamas, I'm not ready! :(

 

Here's a few bonus pictures from the past few weeks that haven't made there way on to the blog yet-

Sweet girl napping at AKK on her Olaf pillow. Naptime has been a hard transition for her. She doesn't particularly like napping and doesn't require as much sleep as some children so that is a rough combo sometimes. But on another note I could sit and watch her sleep forever. I think she has the best profile!

 

Love that smile! I asked them why it was so big with squinty eyes and they said she was tickled :) A happy baby equals a happy mommy.

Harrison Homeplace

As promised I'm posting a few pictures of the house today. We are super proud of it. We've been saving for this for a long time and the waiting has been worth it. It's a wise investment in our eyes!

 

Here is a mini photo album of the new "Harrison Homeplace". I'll do individual rooms once we get them finished.

Welcome to our home! It was built in 1997 so I would still consider it a semi-new build. It is 3,600 square feet with a two-car attached garage, detached garage and a huge patio out back for entertaining. The lot is 2+ acres on a corner so we have lots of room to have fun.

The view from our front porch. There isn't any development on the lot across from us, just beautiful white fencing. Very Kentucky-esque!

 

Sidewalk to our back patio, I don't think I have a picture of it yet. I will work on that! The house is beautifully landscaped and we have several shade trees in the yard along with two weeping willows. The willows were enough to sell me.

 

View looking in from our front door. To the left will be Marcus's study and the right is our formal dining room. Straight ahead goes into our living room with a huge brick fireplace as the centerpiece.

 

My favorite room in the house. A white kitchen was a must for me and when we saw the house for the first time and I caught a glimpse of it from another room I knew I wanted this house. We plan to do a few updates to bring it up to 2014 but the layout is exactly what I wanted. I have pull-out rolling drawers, vertical slot storage for cookie sheets, cutting boards, etc., can lights and a separate walk-in pantry. I LOVE IT.

Right off the kitchen is a little desk area, my new "command center". This was in our building plans so for it to already be in this house was another sign this house was for us. I hope this area will help keep me organized and eliminate minimize junk from other rooms of the house.

Living room with four sets of french doors-two sets leading to the porch and patio and two sets off of the study and dining room. We love this room but it's proving to be tricky with furniture layout due to the multiple walkways. Our floors right now are covered in painter's tape where furniture could potentially go to get a feel for different layouts. This was a tip from our furniture designer at Sprintz and it will be a big help.

Our little half bath that I adore! The previous owners are now people we call friends. They have been so thoughtful, left the house super clean and left all kinds of nice things for us (ahem-a huge deep freeze!!). She knew I loved this bathroom so she left it just like they had it-the wooden stool for Georgia Grace, the trashcan, the framed print on the wall, etc. We are so thankful for them!

And this room gets the best reaction from everyone who sees it for the first time. This is just extra storage on the 2nd story of the house (bonus room is separate and finished). We joked (not really) that we could almost fit our starter home in this room! This will be so handy and "should" greatly decrease our need to use the attic for storage. However everyone seems to tell me I will fill it quicker than I think... :)

 

That's a quick tour of the high spots. More pictures to come and more info on the remodeling we are doing!

Fall Break 2014

I'm back from my unannounced hiatus :) It wasn't planned or intentional it was one of those things that happen. Someday I will have a set routine and a permanent place for my computer to live and more downtime but until then please bear with the weekly updates :) [Shoutout to sweet friends for checking on me and missing my posts-love y'all!]

This week was fall break for us, my first school calendar-related benefit to my new job! We talked about vacationing somewhere but if you keep reading through this long post you will discover what kept us home this week...  

The break started with a big SEC victory for our Cats over South Carolina! 

And ended with another win today to give us a record of 5-1 (2-1 SEC). What a turnaround! 

In two weekends we are headed to a Keeneland/UK football double in Lexington and I'm so excited! Hopefully I will feel well, the weather will cooperate and Hail State will have their first loss of the season! :)

Sunday was homecoming at our church. This was the best picture we got but it works. We're thankful for our church family and love the fellowship with visitors on this special day.

Sunday afternoon Georgia Grace received an early birthday gift from Uncle Jake and Aunt Shanna and went to see Frozen On Ice in Nashville! (She wore her fur to celebrate the event)

When Shanna told her she was taking her to see Frozen she said, " Okay, let me go get my shoes!" Shanna told her, "No baby, church day." She said, "Okay, church then Frozen!" Ha! Loved these quotes my sister-in-law sent me!

This was a big day trip for her and them without one of us going with them and it went great! She loved the show and the "snow".

Sven on the ice, so neat!

Our fall break week was in full swing by now. Some mornings I would do some things while family kept GGH but I tried to not spend too much time away from her. We napped together, went shopping and played played played. It was a fun week that ended too quickly!

We spent some quality time with our best buddy Ro-Ro. He was such a happy boy and we loved getting to see them! There was a lot of this going on... #somanyboyfriends

She was also our little helper this week and dressed the part :) 

One day she spent the day with Gammy and Gran Stan since it was fall break for them too. She always comes home so rotten when she stays with them. We joke that her legs are broke because she gets packed around so much and doesn't want to walk at home :) We're glad she has so many people to spoil her! 

She also took a trip to Jackson's Orchard with them to pick out a pumpkin and for some apple cider. We are going to take her closer to her birthday but she loves it so I'm glad she will get to go multiple times!

Sweetest baby girl. She rode the big cider slider with Gammy and played in the haybales!

We've got a birthday party coming up in two weeks! The invitations are in (Thanks Alexis for finding these for me-super cute!!) and I finally got them to the post office this weekend. Party details are slowly coming together. It's crazy how behind I am compared to last year's party.

But we've been preoccupied for a few weeks with something BIG. Without further adieu....

We bought a house!!!

You read that right. The word "build" is not in that sentence anywhere. When we found out we were expecting and that there would be no way that the house would be ready before the baby was born we decided to switch gears and check out the housing market. The house we bought wasn't even on the market and just kind of fell into our laps. It was an absolute God send. Again He went before us and has provided exactly what we need at this stage of our lives.

Pictures coming tomorrow! :) I won't keep you waiting long!

We are so excited and knee deep in house projects. The house was in great condition and we are just doing a few updates to make it ours. There will be before and after pictures, I promise.

That's all for tonight. We've had a long day in Nashville exchanging our sectional for other furniture (because it doesn't work in our new living room-bummer) and picking out the perfect slab for our new countertops. Exhausting but exciting all rolled into one.

More to come!

Baby Update

Happy October! My favorite month is here. I have loved October always and for many reasons but having an October baby AND finding out the gender of my second baby during this month was the icing on the cake for me. October means the beginning of the holiday season, trips to the pumpkin patch, football, boots, hayrides and the end of allergy season for Marcus ha! We are ready for 31 days of October fun.

Since we will have a two year old (that went by way too quick!) by the end of the month we are getting our last wear out of our "1" dress. I just love this dress on her and it actually fits her better as an almost two year old :) We were taking this picture before school and Daddy drove off so we had to stop to wave to him.

 

My dollbaby growing up too fast but in the most perfect way. I couldn't ask for a better baby girl.

 

Tuesday we had our second prenatal appointment. Marcus went with me which I am thankful for because I had a mini US, two urine samples, five vials of blood and a pap smear. It was a full workup! Everything went great (no passing out episodes) but I was beat the rest of the night.

 

Please tell me how I lose a pound with a 13 week bump this huge?!? It's a mystery to me. And I'm eating the walls down so I guess this sweet baby is draining me of all of it :)

Speaking of sweet baby. He/she had grown so much in four weeks. The hands were up around the face just like Georgia Grace would be positioned in her US pictures. And if you'll notice my uterus is heart-shaped! Love that. The baby looks perfect.

 

We go back in four weeks for our anatomy scan US and to find out the gender! I don't have a strong feeling yet either way. However, for the first time in 13 months of pregnancy I had morning sickness Tuesday morning. And I've also been gagging when I take my prenatal and B12 vitamins. This didn't happen with GGH. But in other ways the pregnancy feels very similar to my first so I won't be shocked either way.

My biggest baby ready to celebrate her birthday month! They decorated AKK for Halloween and where they nap they hung jack-o-lantern lights. They said when she was laying down for nap, she said "pumpkins...orange...orange juice...apple juice!" ha! She impresses me everyday.

 

Hope your week is going well and the excitement of October has captured you too!