"Am I really 5 now?"

People, I have a five year old. It's almost hard for me to write. It really feels like just yesterday I was bringing home the cutest lil' six pound boy you've ever seen. He came out of the womb with an opinion and a plan and to this day maintains that personality. 

He is truly a joy. Parker has quite a few traits that make this momma proud. He hates to see people in pain and is extremely affectionate. He is super creative and loves the outdoors. He is so very smart and is always wanting to learn something new. He loves to make people smile and he gets joy out of being a helper. 

On the flip side, there are a few traits that Parker has exhibited lately that throw up red flags for me. I have my work cut out for me in a few areas.  Parker is bossy. He also has a bit of an attitude when things don't go his way. I feel like if I do my job as a parent and condition him correctly, these two traits can turn into passionate leadership. I read and ask a lot of questions on how to handle children with Parker's personality. I don't worry too much, though, considering that myself and my husband are both a little on the bossy side and have led successful lives. Another aspect of Parker's personality that can get hard to handle at times is that he has the emotional drama of a sixteen year old girl. You wouldn't believe some of the comments he's made to me when being disciplined. Unbelievable. Luckily, those comments have brought a lot of laughter for me over the past five years. Overall, I am so proud of my little man. Sometimes I catch myself just staring at his sweet little face. I am so blessed to have him.

We were in Florida when Parker turned five. I woke him up in the morning with a kiss and a whispered "Happy Birthday." The kid who normally takes ten minutes to roll around and make his way out of the bedroom, shot up and said with so much excitement in his eyes, "Am I really five now!?!" He continued to ask me that throughout the day. So cute.

I planned a last minute trip to Florida so that I could be with my friend, Heidi, as her husband got a much needed kidney transplant. To read about how that family is doing, you can read her blog. Such an incredible story. It worked out because my parents really wanted time with the boys. While there, we managed to make it to Legoland one day and spent a lot of time in the pool.

They are such good boys on the plane now.

 He loves table hockey.

 They were in heaven at Legoland.

 My big five year old!

 I love his crazy eyes :)

 Graham got to ride his first roller coaster and LOVED it. He kept his hands up the entire time!

 Someone was worn out and just crashed.

 I love these boys.

 My family can't get together without going to The Barrel at least once.

We had a combined birthday party for the boys this past weekend when we got home. I'll blog about that soon, but it will be from a new blog page. I decided to switch to WordPress.com and hope that you will continue to follow me over there.

This blog has all been transfered and I have moved to:

www.3boysandagirl.com

See you over there!

Something Simple

When you commit to buying a house, you dive in head first knowing many things about it. The age of the home, the appraisal price, square footage, problem areas, expected updates, etc. are all major factors in the decision. However, one aspect of your home purchase that you don't really get too familiar with until the papers are signed is the people living next door to you. You don't get to interview them before moving in and you can't cancel the deal if you end up with "the crazies" a little too close for comfort. Well, we have been soooooo blessed. We have really enjoyed getting to know our neighbors and are so happy that we can actually be friends with the people who share our property line.

That being said, my neighbor Emily and I have discovered we have a lot in common. We both are mommas who enjoy sitting and sipping on the front porch, sarcasm is our second language, and we both luuuuve sweets :) Soon after moving in our home, Emily had a birthday and I decided I wanted to make her something yummy. Dark Chocolate cake with white chocolate buttercream seemed appropriate. I wanted to try a new frosting technique and I wanted to keep the cake simple and elegant. Emily is a bit of a southern Belle ;) 

After watching this tutorial, I filled my decorating bag and went to town. It only took about 5-10 minutes. Easy peasy and so pretty. Give it a try on your next cake!

It's so hot hot hot in here!

Got to love some Rascal Flatts ;) Today is the first day in what seems like weeks that we've had a decent temperature outside. I am sitting out on my deck writing this post as the boys play. They aren't allowed in the creek today, because the past few storms have been dooseys and the water is rather high.   We were blessed to have only lost power for a few days compared to some of our friends who have been out of commission for over 9 days. Our yard is a mess from all the crazy wind! I see it as something that needs to be picked up while the boys see the downed tree limbs as endless sword fighting opportunities. There's boys for ya.

I can't catch up with all that we've been doing, so I won't try. We've made some progress on our home inside and out. Currently, I'm trying to decide the color for the entry, dining, and formal living room. They are all connected in a way so I'm doing a simple beige/tan color in all of them. It's so hard deciding on a beigey-tan color! I need to pick it out and get it on the walls. Not sure how long that will take. Remember people, I'm doing this all myself while watching two little people. It's takes a bit longer than desired.

While we like to DIY things ourselves most of the time, we try to realize when something just isn't going to happen unless we hire a professional. Doing bamboo floors landed in that category. We wanted to try and learn how to put them down, but lets face it, David is busy and I don't want him spending multiple weekends on his knees putting down floors. We hired someone while we were in Myrtle Beach to have the dining room, formal living room, and upstairs landing all laid by the time we got home. It was rather awesome to walk into a completed project. Too bad we can't just hire all our work to be done while going on multiple vacations. A girl can dream, can't she?

Don't mind the disheveled and/or empty look in these rooms. Just focus on the pretty new floor.

Like I said before, I wouldn't have necessarily picked Bamboo as our hardwood of choice, but since they had already laid so much of it in the house, we felt it was the best decision to just stick with it and we are really happy with how it turned out. 

In other improvement news, the outside landscaping got a cheap makeover. We didn't want to pour tons of money into it, but the drabness of the wanna-be flower beds wasn't working for us. Here's the view of the house when we moved in.

Yeah, the bush kind of blocked half of the house. Here's the new view.

We replanted the hydrangeas from the last house around the mailbox and brought up some rocks from the creek as an edging. It will fill in and look more established with time, but I love how much more open it is. 

The front beds were in sad sad shape.

We ripped up all the existing bushes and edging out. We transplanted the hostas from the pots to the ground and bought a few evergreens for up next to the house. We just added some annuals in the middle this year to save money. We'd like to add a few perennials every year til our landscaping is pretty, full, and established, but this year was just baby steps.

Better, huh? I know they are a little barren and lacking height/depth, but it's a start!