We've got spirt yes we do...

We've got spirit, how 'bout you?
Two weeks into the school year and we found ourselves at the first "Back to School" night at our new school. We have always loved participating and supporting our kids school events, but at a new school it's even more important to get out there and get involved. When we moved I decided that we needed to embrace the transition and jump into everything feet first, no holding back. So we bought the kids school t-shirts on day 1. (It's an important note here to say that we attended our previous school for 4 years and never purchased the school shirt. We did acquire two of them over the years as hand-me-downs, but I never purchased Joey Katie one.)
This was a back to school night like no other. They had two bouncy houses and free face painting, a Kona Ice Truck ($), Papa John's Pizza ($), cupcakes ($), local vendors with giveaways and games, and a silent auction. We are no strangers to the school PTA PTO silent auction fundraising game. We regularly bid for such items as "teacher time" and last year we won the coveted Principal for the Day auction. This year we managed to place the winning bid for teacher time for both Katie and Anderson. Katie gets to attend a movie night, and Anderson gets to go bowling. Principal for the Day went for a cool $350, but that was not our bid. We choose to put the money down on a 4 pack of tickets to LEGOLAND, and we won!!!
I think that we all left the evening feeling good. The kids had consumed two snow cones each, we had a box of cupcakes coming home with us, Anderson had exhausted himself with some friends on the bouncy houses, Katie had spent a good chunk of the time with a new found friend, they both had won an auction, Steve finally had tickets to LEGOLAND, and the PTO had made $250 off the McRaes.
Safe to say, we are definitely in the "we've got spirit" game!

We moved!

Based on the title of the last blog on here, it's been about 5 years since I graced you with my presence. Sorry about that!
Joey is now 9 and Anderson is an incredible 5 year old. We celebrated their birthdays this year in the most epic way possible...we moved them 887 miles away from the only home they have ever know. We moved them away from all their friends, their extended family, and pretty much everything familiar. If it sounds dramatic, it was. It was a hard thing for me to do as an adult so of course the kids found it difficult.
We are now residents of Winter Garden, Florida. We are 7.1 miles north of WDW Magic Kingdom Park, close enough to see the 9pm nightly fireworks from the front door. That's a pretty cool outcome of the move. We have been exploring the area quite a bit and starting to slowly adjust to Florida life.

Joey Turned 4!

(Back at the end of July...) With all of the regular fanfare she has come to expect around her birthday. This year, I wanted to make sure that she knew she was special as her birthday was just 11 days after the birth of Anderson. On her actual birthday we celebrated with my family out at Grammie's house to a maxed out Strawberry Shortcake theme! The following weekend we rocked out at Romp N Roll with several of her friends for a groovin' rock star birthday bash! Both parties were a ton of fun and she acquired way more "stuff" than needed.
She is more sassy at 4 than ever before. She is also just as sweet as ever and cute and funny too! She can melt my heart and make me so mad all in the same minute, but I wouldn't trade her for anything.

I always enjoy putting the birthday movies together and reflecting back on the year. I like looking back on the things we did as a family, the milestones she hit as a little girl and growth and change that one short year can bring. It is always bittersweet. So here it is, Joey's 4th year in review...

Joey's 3rd Birthday Video

I realized that I posted this to facebook, but never to her blog...oh I am all over the place with this girl's history! For some reason I can't get it to show up in the YouTube feed on the right hand side, but it will at least be in the blog history.

Joey's BIG News!

That is right! Joey is finally going to be a Big Sister! Her little brother is due to arrive on her birthday! Yes, you heard that correctly too. Not only will we be having another baby, but our second baby is due on our first baby's birthday!

Joey vs. the Vaseline

I'm sure you know who won...

We have those nights, you know the ones where your child just does not want to go to bed and they come up with any excuse to stay up. Well about a month ago we had a long streak of those nights! One night in particular she tried everything and we were at the point of ignoring most of it. So while Steve and I were reading in bed we heard a lot of noise coming from Joey's room, but we chose to ignore it. BAD IDEA! Ten minutes later she came upstairs to tell us that she was lonely in her room, or in other words it was a ploy to get into our bed with us. Steve looked her up and down and said "Joey what have you been up to?" She was standing there in nothing but inside out, backwards underwear and she was shinny. She was covered in Vaseline! 

Steve took her into the bathroom to clean her up and he yells out "the water is beading up and rolling right off her, I can't get her clean!" It took a lot of scrubbing on Steve's part and I'm not sure if the underwear made it, they must have weighed 1 pound they were so covered in Vaseline.

Oh wow, it was so funny that we couldn't even be upset about the situation. If it had not happened at night there would have been photos! Needless to say all her bed linens had to be washed so she got to spend the night in Mommy & Daddy's room after all!

Teeth

Gap-toothed Grin! 2011-2012 School Photo

Joey says to me the other night, "I lost a really little tooth in the front of my mouth."
I chuckled, this is the second or third time that I have heard her say this statement or something similar. I think it is so cute. I reminded her that it is just the way that her teeth are coming in that she has the little gap between her two front teeth. Of course I'm sure that her thumb sucking is not helping things one bit.
She went on to explain to me that turtles have a little egg tooth that they use to get out of their eggs and then they lose it on the way to the ocean. She fully believes this is what has happened to her.
I also went on to explain that while she hasn't lost a tooth yet, she will probably lose her first one in the next 1-2 years. But that it would be okay, because the lose of a baby tooth is followed by an adult tooth coming in its place. "Oh", she said, "I have baby teeth in my mouth, well these must be the Mommy & the Daddy" as she points to her two front teeth.
I love the thought process!

Funny of the day...

At dinner last night Joey says to me, "I like this boy, Ellis. He's my boyfriend and he smells really good!"

I laughed of course because it was cute...but she is like me a sucker for a good smelling guy! It's not like 3 and 4 year olds were cologne though. Glad she is learning to appreciate the little things that make a good mate so early. However, I do think that 3 is a little early to already have these thoughts. Just another sign that she is going to be a handful in about 9-10 years!

Joey Says the funniest things...

Saturday 9/24/11

Driving in the car, the whole family had been out and about running errands and had lunch. On the way home Josephine says "oh damn it". Steve and I look at each other and smirk. I had just said this the day before and she had repeated it so neither of us were surprised when it came back out the next day.
We tried to let it go, but after she said it 3 times I said "Joey, do you even know what that means?" To which she replies "it means your frustrated."
What a smart little girl!

Wednesday 9/28/11

Steve was getting ready this morning and asked Joey for kiss before he left. She says to him "Daddy where are you going?"
Steve: "To work"
Joey: "Why" (this is the main question asked right now)
Me: "Daddy has to go to work to make money so that we can go to Mickey's house this weekend"
Joey: "Oh, ok" and as Steve is walking out the door she throws in "Daddy, got some money for me and Mommy too, ok!"
Oh if it were only that easy!

Wednesday 9/28/11

It is still warm and humid here this time of year. It is about 70 (feels a bit warmer) when we leave the house in the morning and gets up to 78 or so during the day. Josephine is still wearing tank tops and sun dresses daily unless I fight with her to put something else on. This morning she had a tank dress on and I was trying to get her to put a sweater on, of course she said "no, I don't want it". Since it is new and I just bought it, I asked "Do you not like it for today or do you not like it at all?" So you looks at me walks away and says "I don't like today, tomorrow or ever!"
Well ok, 3 going on 13 here at our house.

Spring Break & Easter

Now that Joey goes to school we are subject to the school calendar for traveling. We just got back from a very nice week in Hilton Head with my father (Pop-pop). We had beautiful weather while we were there, we hit the beach all but one day! In addition to beach time we also got to play with our cousins, shop, eat, golf and hunt for Easter eggs!
I have uploaded some of the pictures highlighting the vacation. I took over 800 so appreciate the cut back that I did for the album. I know that some of the pictures seem similar, but when you have such a fantastic subject it is hard not to go camera crazy.
Pictures can be viewed on the right side of the blog or at this link.