Flower Party!

I am a little late posting about Addie Blaire's 2nd Birthday party, but I had so many pictures to go through it has taken me awhile. I have posted several, but if you could see the pile I took this is only a few of them. I had posted before about the flower party invitation and party we were having for her. It turned out to be a lot of fun and a little painful for Addie Blaire! She seemed to retain several injuries at the party! I must admit I was struggling so hard with her turning two because she isn't a baby anymore (well she will always be my baby, but you know what I mean!) I guess I thought she was ready for a grown up party, but maybe not quite yet, considering that the blow up slide left her with a bruised chin and the castle with a bloody lip:( I felt so bad for her but she was such a good sport, as always. She keep on going despite it all. I posted several pictures because I know this is the closest I will ever get to doing a scrapbook for her so hopefully these will provide her with enough memories of her 2nd birthday! I love you, baby!

I surprised her the morning of her real birthday with her very own cake when she woke up.
The little dog was so cute and she loved it!

I had purchased flower headbands for all the kids at the party, but the family had some fun with them too! I know Aunt Brandee is going to kill me for this one! (well and maybe "Bobo" too.)

The day of the party Addie Blaire was in the mood for fun! She woke up and we presented her with her birthday present which was a little house just for her. I found it and knew it would be just perfect for her. It is so girly and I loved all the bright colors. It also has a built in phone and doorbell.

She and I decorated it with lots of flowers and a little froggy too.

She got so excited when she realized that everyone was showing up for her party. She loves to sing happy birthday to everyone, birthday or not. So she started singing it to herself in this picture!

She had her own personal flower chair for the day.

We set everything up in the backyard. It was supposed to rain but turned out quite sunny and extremely hot. I felt so bad for everyone because we have a huge backyard, but absolutely no trees! It made for some sweaty kids and parents for that matter. We served flower cookies, dirt cake with every one's own personal flower pot for serving, a few snacks, water and lemonade. The best part turned out was the snow cone machine that came with the blow up castle. The kids loved making their own snow cones with lots of fun flavors to choose from!

The castle and slide I rented for the kids. They had a lot of fun and I have to admit I made it down each one myself!

Addie Blaire did such a good job jumping in the castle, that is until she bumped into someone else and busted her lip. I felt so sorry for her. She cried it out for a second and then was ready to party on .

Dad helped her get up to the top of the slide and she was so excited to take her turn. The only problem was that she chose to go down the way she does the regular slide and when she got to the bottom there was a 2 ft. drop. She ended up hitting her chin on the ground and once again she cried for a few seconds and then was right back up there with the rest of the kids.

She loved playing in the bubbles that Pop brought for her.

The kids all went home with flower headbands, and a bucket with flower sunglasses for the girls and water guns for the boys. They each also got their very own flower pot, with potting soil and flower inside.

The dirt cake that we made for the party, filled with lots of flowers, dirt (oreos), and worms!
The birthday cake filled with butterflies and flowers. It didn't taste too bad either, we seemed to eat it for days after the party.

The birthday girl blowing out her candles. She seemed to really like that part because she kept saying "do it again mommy." She also sang along to Happy Birthday with everyone else.
Poor thing she got so hot playing outside we had to take a break and eat inside to cool down for a bit.
Ben and Heather

This is the picnic table "G" got her for her birthday. Katie and Lilly seemed to enjoy it!

The big kids having some fun. We ended up having to wet it down because it was so hot, which made it twice the fun for them.

Some of the kids from the party, it was tough to get them all together for a picture as you could imagine.

I don't know why Addie Blaire didn't want her picture taken. Could it be she felt like she was being followed around by the crazy mommy paparazzi!! In fact, she even said as she was opening her gifts "no more pictures, mommy". That is when you know you've taken too many, when your 2 yr. old tells you!

She got so tired, running around. I had this little flower cup with a cool straw to entice her to keep drinking, because her face was so red I was afraid she was getting too hot.

Me and Angie

At the end of the party when the other kids quit sliding we filled the bottom with water and balls and Addie Blaire and her two cousins, Lydia and Katie Ella had a blast playing in them.

It is so cute to see the three of them together. I picture lots of good times had between them in the coming years since they are all the same age and have so much fun together.

Addie got several wondrful gifts, She loved her babies that she got, not to mention her Stawberry Shortcake (which is her favorite movie right now.) She also got this cute Bible purse, which she insists on carrying with her everywhere she goes now! She got her own personal bug catcher, and shovel, and fishing pole. She got a baby that even swims with her from Aunt Brandee and Mason and a cool art set too. She really had a great birthday!

I think one of the coolest presents she recieved though came from my sister. She is so creative and being that she is a teacher, she wrote her a book. She book is all about Addie Blaire and what she has been up to this year. It tells about her love of ducks, her favorite songs, her favorite toys and all about the family. It is so neat because she put it all to pictures of Addie Blaire doing all these things. I will definelty treasure it for years to come and I know so will Addie Blaire. Thanks Aunt T and Uncle B! By the way, she would do a great job for someone else that might be interested in utilizing her talents. Just let me know and I will get you in touch!

Some sunglasses she got from Aunt T. The beach towels she got for our trip to the beach in a few weeks!!

This is where the pictures end, since she put a stop to them at this point!!! I guess I am relieved considering this is the longest post I think I have ever done, and I am tired too!

Summer Fun!

Well, I am combining a few posts into one because the title to this post pretty much sums it up. We have been enjoying summer to the fullest the past few weeks and that means lots of fun in the sun and water!! We are starting this summer off with lots of trips to the pool to get our little fish ready to swim. Actually, maybe a few too many trips because we just got our first dose of medicine for swimmer's ear!! (So maybe it is time for a break for a few days.) Here are some pictures from the past few weeks.

We went to the pool one day in Arkadelphia with my friend Caron and her kiddos. It was so much fun!! It is just too bad they got something that cool after I had to leave. I would have loved lifeguarding at this pool so much better!
Carrying on the Fowler family tradition of lifeguarding, my cousin Lindsey is one of the lifeguards there and does an excellent job if I do say so. It is a good thing since my child was the one running wild.

I don't know if I can even count the number of times Addie Blaire made it down this frog! She loved doing it herself, but even more she loved to cheer for the other kids as they came down. Too funny.

She loved these little sprinkler things. I couldn't get her away from them.There is nothing like a good icee after a hard day of swimming!
I got these pictures of Addie Blaire and Griffin the other day. This is the shirt I brought her back from Las Vegas for well, just read the shirt and you will know why...

Buddies.. these two crack me up.

I took Addie out to the farm the other weekend and while we waited on Pop we had some fun in the dirt.

Once again, as you might remember from an earlier post about Addie Blaire finding a flower in the middle of an ant hill, she was able to find this tiny flower in the middle of all that dirt. I found a sign that I put up over her room that reminds me of this and how she brightens my world it reads "My days are always happy and bright." -truer words were never spoken:)

This was our first trip to "G's" pool.

She and Griffin just started screaming one night and I just loved the way it played out in the pictures of the two of them.

I was watering the flowers one day and decided to let her join in on the fun. I guess that was a mistake though because she had so much fun that know watering flowers is a 30 minute ordeal followed by a bath for a very muddy baby!

Flowerbaby!

I decided this year to do Addie Blaire's second birthday party with the theme of a flower party. So in keeping with this theme I decided to have her on the invitation with a hat full of flowers. I found some flowers that I attached to a hat for her to wear. She and I had so much fun during an afternoon photo shoot while dad was away (because as you would guess he probably wasn't as into the flower hat idea as I was!) I had to show a few of the many shots that I got that day. It is pretty obvious how she felt about it too, by the range of emotions that are in the following pictures! I actually by the end found that the best way to take them was to put her in her favorite chair in front of the television and put the Care Bears (her favorite.) on. I then sat in front of the television and started taking shots. It was a brilliant idea because I had her attention and she reacted to everything on screen so I got some pretty cute pictures. Isn't it amazing what a desperate mom will do for some silly pictures!

It started out good, then gradually it went downhill, time for a nap!

This is the finished invitation (minus some personal info) thanks to a little help from a friend of Brandee's. She is great to work with me and can really do anything I can imagine which is sometimes a very scary thing!