Mother's Day Weekend

Happy Mother's Day!  So thankful to have a wonderful mother and mother-in-law who have been incredible influences in my life and Josh's life!  We love you, DeeDee and Grana!  We love you both very much and enjoyed seeing y'all this weekend!

Susan's BEAUTIFUL and yummy cake:

Look Alike

EVERYONE says Grady looks just like Josh...

Can you see why???

Thanks for sending this picture, Paw-Paw!  :)

Pink, or Blue???

I'm not sure if I have shared on the blog the exciting news that I AM GOING TO BE AN AUNT!!!!!  Susan and Jon are expecting their first child in August or September, and I am just so pumped up about that!  Anyway, they had their sonogram to find out the sex of the baby on Monday, and so of COURSE Susan had to throw a big "reveal" party that night.  Worked out wonderfully because Jenny happened to be home from Idaho, so our whole family was there!

(Beware...picture overload coming...  I think I took 78 pictures, but I am posting only some!)

Pink, or Blue???  

The front door:

The bottle tree...  Susan had pink and blue bottles and we had to make our "votes" and place them on the tree: 

 The pink and blue candy bar...  Grady's favorite place!  He hung out next to this table all night.  ha!

 Grady's vote:  BOY!

 Pete's vote:  BOY!

 Jenny's vote:  BOY!

 Vera's vote:  GIRL (I made her pick it...I was the only one who'd placed a pink bottle on the tree at this point, and I needed some support!)

 DeeDee's vote:  GIRL!

 Susan had a table full of goodies...sweet stuff of COURSE...and she went with a theme of "things a pregnant lady has been craving!"  It was really cute and yummy!

 This was my favorite thing...  She had little notes for us to write to Baby Harvey...  Here's Pete giving his words of wisdom to his future grandchild...  (YIKES, no TELLING what is on this piece of paper!  Watch out, Baby Harvey!)

 Mom and I writing our notes...

 Grady wanted to write a note for his little cousin!  SO SWEET!  I LOVE it that he came up with all of these answers himself!  I had to explain to him what "respect" means and such, but he totally came up with these answers... I promise I did not tell him to mention the Bulldogs...He is brainwashed and he came up with strictly on his own!  LOVE IT! ***Side note:  To anyone who doesn't know, Jon is a HUGE Alabama fan.  Grady's comment about the "elephants" is in response to this!!! (Click on the picture so you can read it better)...  Sorry it is sideways, couldn't get it to turn around.

 The "REVEAL" cake!!!

 FINALLY, We have been waiting all night for them to dig into this cake!!!

 And the verdict is....................

IT'S a BOY!!!!!!!!!!!

 Jon's dad was on the phone in KY so he could "hear" the verdict!  I didn't get pictures, but both of Jon's parents also predicted a boy.  So Mom and I were wrong this time!  I am so surprised, but so super excited!  Grady Hammer was fist-pumping like a mad-man!  It was hilarious!

 Jon had to replay the video of our reactions SEVERAL times because Grady's reaction was so funny!  I think he was happier than anyone (well, maybe except for Jon!!!)

 The two grandmothers, all smiles!!!

 We love you, Aunt Sue-Sue!  You are going to be such a great mama!!!

I cannot WAIT to watch these two be parents!  Y'all are going to be wonderful parents and little man Harvey is so lucky to be born into your family!  I love him already and cannot wait to hold him and spoil him rotten and teach him to love the Bulldogs!  He is already one very blessed little guy!  (He just needs himself a name!!!!)  ha ha!

Love,

AUNT Julie

(HOW FUN IS THAT!???)

Easter 2013

As we do each spring, Grady and Vera had their pics taken with Lisa Patti.  This was Vera's first year to do the pictures and she had a ball!  Grady (as usual) was still shy and a little unsure of the bunnies.  For whatever reason, he's never wanted to get too close to them.  Vera, on the other hand, wanted the bunny, goat, and chick to sit in her lap!  She laughed and giggled the entire time her pictures were being taken!  Here are a few of their pictures...

Time to dye eggs!  

So disappointed that Grady-man RUSHED through this in 5 minutes this year!  I'm hoping that Vera will make me proud in a couple of years and spend hours with me decorating eggs like Susan, Jenny, and I used to do!  :)  I didn't get many pictures this year...

Easter morning, raiding the buckets from the bunny!

We were SUPER excited that DeeDee and Pete came over to go to church with us on Easter Sunday and have lunch at our house along with Susan and Jon!  Once again, I didn't get many pictures at all.  The rain came in the middle of our egg hunt, so we wrapped that up in a snap and got back inside!  Grady (as usual) stripped down and removed his church outfit the minute he walked in the door, opting for basketball shorts and a tshirt...  so we didn't get a cute picture of the two kiddos in their Easter outfits...

ONE!

VERA IS ONE!!!!!  Cannot believe it's been a year!  She is such a grown-up little lady!  We had her party on Saturday with a "Very Hungry Caterpillar" theme.  I thought it was perfect and fitting for my little caterpillar who is growing into such a little butterfly!  Susan made her SUPER CUTE cakes of course!  (And super yummy, too!)

 

 Of course she had to have a little bit of help from Grady to blow out the candle...  He was more than happy to help out!

 Vera wasn't so sure about the cake...  it was s sugar rush for a kid who has had little to no sugar other than what's in the baby fruits she eats...

 We all signed a keepsake copy of The Very Hungry Caterpillar for her to keep from her first birthday...  Here's Grady signing his name!

 Unfortunately, when you're the mom of the birthday girl, you have no time to take pictures.  Plus, it doesn't help when your camera battery dies in the middle of the party...  AGH!  Way to be prepared, Julie!  So, I need some pictures... (hint, hint...Faye and Viola!!!)

THANK YOU to all of our sweet family who came to celebrate this special day with us!  We were so glad you could be a part of V's first birthday!

Here are some pictures I took of her in her caterpillar dress the other day...  Man, she is so big now!  Going to be a TALL girl!  Still not walking, but pulling up on everything!  She is the fastest crawler in the entire world!  Grady never did crawl on his knees...He was an "army crawler" and drug his legs behind him.  She crawls in perfect formation SUPER fast wherever she goes...She seems to think that she has no time for walking.  She can get places faster in her own way...

 She is the happiest girl in the world, too!  She grins constantly, or has her tongue sticking out.  She laughs all the time...mostly at Grady, who she ADORES!  She wants to be right where he is at all times.  I am afraid she is going to be a MAJOR tom-boy!  LOVES Grady's toys and prefers them over her dolls any day!  Hates socks and shoes, bows, and headbands.

 She is a major drooler...  She has been drooling like mad since about 4 or 5 months old...  So you'd think that she would have a mouth full of teeth.  But no...  only two.  They came in on Christmas night and we haven't seen any more yet...  So she's not eating a lot of food-food...still baby food.  Tried giving her a few things mushed up, but she can't really chew much.  We are hoping for some more teeth soon!  Finally finished up with formula a few weeks ago and she LOVES her milk!  :)

 She babbles all the time, but hasn't really mastered many words yet.  She can say MaMaMaMa and DaDaDaDa, but sometimes she just chants it and I don't really think she means to call our names...she's just "talking" and making sounds.  When she sees Grady, sometimes she says the "g-g-g-g" sound, but that's a pretty hard name to say.  What's really funny is that we have noticed her saying "Uh-oh!" alot lately when she purposely drops something and then wants you to pick it up...  So my child can say "Uh-oh" but not "Mama" and "Daddy"...  HA!  She waves "Bye-bye" and "Hey" and we are working on peek-a-boo and blowing kisses!



I am so grateful that God has brought such a precious little girl like you into our lives. You are so fun to watch and you melt my heart every day.  I hope you have many, many more birthdays and I can't wait to see how much you grow and learn this year, Baby-V!
Love,
Mama