Busy Weekend

Ashley and Avery

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This new camera is too much fun! I haven't quite gotten it down pat, but I am really enjoying learning how to use this thing. I didn't have a really good reason to put that picture at the top of this post, but a sweet picture of a mama and her baby gets me every time. Anyway, on to the post! A couple of weeks ago, Alan's parents, Cathy and Gary (otherwise known as Maw and Paw) came up to visit. I am one of those lucky girls who has in-laws that I can not only tolerate, but who I would gladly welcome to move into our basement if they would show the slightest inclination of wanting to do so. So in other words, I was so excited that they were coming to visit. It was a very short trip--they got here Saturday morning and left Sunday morning--but we had a very full day and had a great time. The day started on Saturday morning when they arrived at Ashley and Matt's house. We headed over there and spent some time playing with this precious girl:

The hair hasn't calmed down a bit!

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I feel like I can just hear her thinking, "What are you doing???"

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Next, we went and watched Jacob play in his soccer game, which his team won. It was a beautiful day, perfect weather for the game. This is Michigan, so I had sat shivering through most of his games before this one.

I didn't get the exact moment when he scored his goal, but this is close!

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After that, we went back to our house to rest for a bit, because Paw Avery needed a nap.

Avery and Paw

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Next, we headed out to Jacob's basketball game.

Here he is making his move.

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Here are Maw, Ashley and Avery.

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This was Avery's first basketball game. With this family, it definitely won't be her last.

Maw, Jacob and Paw.

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Jacob wasn't particularly happy because this was the first game they had lost all season.

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After the game, we went back to our house to spend some time together. We had put a pork loin on to smoke before we left for the ballgame, so we had some good old-fashioned pulled-pork BBQ to eat for supper. Anybody that knows us knows that THIS...

...is how we feel about good pulled-pork BBQ.

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So we sat around and ate, talked, loved on each other...

Avery with her Daddy Matt

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...played some basketball...

Ashley

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...loved on each other some more...

Avery and Paw

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...ate and ate and ate, and loved each other some more.

Maw and Avery

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Okay, okay, I know those pictures only show various people loving on Avery, but a baby is just a camera magnet and it was the first time I was around her since I got my camera. I will try to take more pictures of everyone else next time. Which I hope is soon!

Mothers' Day 2010, continued...

I was already in shock after seeing the camera that I wanted so badly, but then I saw this perfect card that Jacob had made for me:

How cute is that? He is SUCH a great kid. When it said, "Check your e-mail," I assumed that he had done another artistic-type thing on the computer and had e-mailed it, but I was wrong. When I checked my e-mail, this is what I found:

Alan, Jacob and I are going to visit my sister Susan and her family in Florida for 3 days! I am BEYOND excited about this. I miss Susan, BJ and their babies SO much I can't stand it, and come on, we're talking about FLORIDA! I am ever so much more impressed with Florida since we moved to Michigan. It was 46 degrees and rainy all day here today, and all I could think about was our upcoming trip. Also, Jacob has never seen the ocean, so I really look forward to getting to take him to the beach. SO excited.

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Did I not tell you have the best husband and son EVER?

Mothers' Day 2010

See this guy?

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And this guy?

Best husband and son EVER. They were the best husband and son ever before today, but today they REALLY outdid themselves.

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First of all, the first thing I saw when I walked into the kitchen this morning was the camera that I have been coveting and saving for for about a year. I had only saved about half of the money I needed, and I was worried I wouldn't be able to scrounge up the rest of it before Carter is born. Turns out, Alan had been saving, too, just so he could help me out buying it. He not only did that, but he bought me a zoom lens and a camera bag, too! I am LOVING it, as you may or may not be able to tell by the pictures above. But that wasn't even the best part--I'm out of time now, though, so I'll have to share the rest as soon as I get a chance to upload a few more pictures!

Carter at 29 Weeks, 2 Days

We finally came up with a name, but we still haven't settled on a middle name. It is funny, because I look back at our list of names early on in the pregnancy and we considered the name Carter but I scratched it off the list pretty early. After looking at tens of thousands of names, we came back around to it and decided we really like it. So, Carter it is! Any suggestions for a middle name would be greatly appreciated!

Yesterday we went to have a 3-D (or is it 4-D?) ultrasound performed. Unfortunately, Hank decided to be stubborn, and this is pretty much the extent of what we saw:

He kept both hands covering his face the entire time. We have ONE shot where you can see a profile of his eyes and nose, and he is covering up only his mouth with his upper arm, but it is kind of like one of those optical illusions where you either see the old woman or the young woman--I think I would have to point everything out to you for you to see it. Here it is:

I can see his precious little fat cheeks and little nose, can you? The ultrasound estimated his current weight as 3 pounds, 11 ounces, or 2 weeks ahead. He is pretty much measuring 2 weeks ahead on everything except head circumference, which is measuring 3 weeks ahead--lucky me. Jacob's head was in the 95th percentile when he was born--hence the C-section. :( Anyway, we are supposed to go back sometime next week for another 3D/4D ultrasound to try to see his face again. We got another good 2-D profile shot. Precious boy. *Sigh*.

No Words Necessary--starring Ava and Tyler

As promised...

...here are some updated pictures of my adorable niece,Avery Ann. She is a little bit over 2 months old now, and she is just TOO cute. She has the sweetest smile, and her hair is just AWESOME!

Look at that sweet smile, and that HAIR!

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She has SUCH a sweet face.

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Ashley sent this to me by e-mail, saying,

"We got our hair did to go to the dr yesterday!!!!" Love it.

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With all the pregnancy hormones, this one is about enough to make me cry!

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What do you think? Does she already look like she's going to be trouble?

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I am SO thankful to have Ashley, Matt and Avery in Michigan with us for at least another year while Ashley finishes her residency at the local hospital (as CHIEF resident, by the way, no big thang...). I'm afraid that they are going to scoot right back down South as soon as she is done, though, and I can't say that I blame them!

Basketball Fever

Jacob has been playing basketball in various leagues since he was 4, but last summer was the first time he really started taking it seriously and practicing, and started taking an interest in watching it on tv. I know he realizes how much Alan enjoys it, and you can tell Jacob really wants to make him proud by being good at it. They have really enjoyed playing together. This video is of Alan playing a game with Jacob last summer on the lower goal.

This year Jacob practices on a 10-foot goal (but still plays on an 8-foot goal in his league), and it is amazing how much he has improved. Alan is his coach. I'll have to get some new video and put it on here to compare.

A little bit too ambitious...

In Jacob's class at school, whenever a kid has a birthday they bring in cupcakes for the class. I had been seeing these REALLY cute fondant cakes online made out of Oreo cakesters...

... so I got the brilliant idea that I was going to make these little white fondant cakes with the University of Kentucky logo on them, since Jacob has gotten to where he is ALL about the University of Kentucky after watching every single one of their basketball games this season with Alan.

I thought, I'm fairly artistic, right? This is right up my alley! WRONG. I bought my Oreo Cakesters, fondant and food coloring, cut out my logo and began working on the first little cake. I got it wrapped in the white fondant and then I took some of the fondant and put a few drops of blue food coloring in it and mixed it into a pretty Kentucky blue. So far so good.

At that point, I started to cut the UK logo out of the Kentucky blue fondant using the logo I cut out as a stencil. Things quickly went downhill from there. (If I was better at this blogging thing, this is where I would have the play-by-play of pictures of my failure, but of course, I'm pretty bad at this blogging thing, so I don't.) I really underestimated how hard it would be to cut the fondant in all the nooks and crannies of that logo. I got through one single UK (which didn't look half-bad), and decided that there was no way I was going to be able to do 23 more of them.

So, we scratched that and went with plan B. I happened to have chocolate cake mix and icing in my pantry, so I quickly threw that together and made 24 cupcakes. I didn't really have a lot of any one kind of decorations for the cupcakes, and Jacob said EVERYONE brings in just sprinkles, so we brought out the whole arsenal of sprinkles, colored sugar, candies and chocolate chips and Jacob and I decorated them together. I am actually glad the pretty little fondant cakes didn't work out, because I tasted one and they were NOT very good, and Jacob and I had a lot of fun decorating these together.

Live and learn...now I just have to figure out a good use for my remaining 4 pounds of fondant...

What should I call this picture? Suspicious Minds

This is an old picture of Jacob and Ava from when they visited from Christmas, but I love the funny way they are looking at each other and I just realized that I hadn't posted it. I don't think either of them really knew what to make of the other one! I was trying to think of a cute caption for it, but I guess I'm just not creative enough. Any ideas?

Avery Ann Norris

Introducing Avery Ann Norris, daughter of Ashley and Matt Norris (Alan's sister and her husband), born February 27, 2010, 8 lbs, 4 oz and I think she was 21 1/2 inches. She is SO beautiful. I've been meaning to introduce her for a while, but I took these pictures with my non-digital SLR camera and then lent Ashley the picture CD. I finally got it back so I can share.

Avery with Maw

Avery with Paw

Avery with Maw and Paw

Avery with Uncle Alan




Avery with her daddy

She is less than a half hour old in these pictures. She was so alert! I can't wait to share the more recent pictures of her--she is just adorable! I'm still trying to figure that one out, though, because Ashley has sent most of them to me on her i-phone, and for some reason I can't save them as a .jpg or other format I can put on the blog. The best I can do is cut them and paste them into Word. I tried cutting them and pasting them into the blog, and that didn't work, either. If you know how to do this, let me know!