JLB Easter Bunny

Lent was absolutely out of control this year! I feel like the entire 40 days flew by and Easter Sunday was here before I knew it. Thankfully, I got an email that the Easter Bunny was going to make a stop by the Junior League building one Sunday afternoon. So, I loaded the girls up in the car, and off we went to see him! The sun wasn't cooperating-blazing bright through the window, so the girls were very patient in sitting and waiting for the light to cooperate! Maggie was absolutely thrilled to see him...Mary Allison was skeptical at first, but once she saw Maggie liked him, she was all in. The longer they sat, however, the more impatient she got...so the paci came out! So thankful that we got to squeeze in a visit!




Many, many thanks to Anna Sizemore for taking these pictures...Anna, if you are still reading...THANK YOU for organizing this!

Playing in the Rain

Maggie had Ella over for a playdate a few weeks ago, and while she was at our house, it rained like cats and dogs...a lot! We accumulated a bit of a swimming pool sized puddle in our driveway. When Allison came to pick up Ella, we started talking, and before I knew it, the girls were soaking wet. They found that puddle and go to playing! They had so much fun splashing around. Of all of the kiddos, Mary Allison might have had the most fun!






Oh the simple pleasures in life!

Ballet Recital Preview

Mary Allison and I were so excited to be invited to Maggie's ballet class to see what she's been doing. MA is typically in the stroller during Maggie's class, but whenever I let her out, she's running to the studio-she wants to be in there with her sister so badly!!

They did a recital preview for the parents, and it was a hoot! Maggie, as I have always said, has never met a mirror she didn't like. That was just about all she did...watch herself in the mirror! HA! The dance was precious, and I can't wait to see the real deal in a few weeks! We've both made some sweet friends through Vestavia Dance, and I'm thrilled to watch Maggie's LOVE for dance. She would go every day if I'd let her!

In the routine, they hug their buddy-her buddy is Grace...she was not interested in hugging Grace at that very moment!



I love that her hands are up and mostly everyone else's are down-she was having too much fun putting on a show to pay attention...hilarious!



A close up...



Finally giving Grace a good 'ol Maggie hug!



Stay tuned for pictures from the REAL recital in a few weeks! I can't wait!

A Wicked Good Time

Courtney and I gave my mom tickets to see Wicked (for the second time all together-we love tradition in my family) for Christmas. When we bought the tickets in November, we had no idea what a crazy, busy weekend that would be, but they forged ahead and made a 24 hour trip out of it! Whew!

We took NO pictures together, I'm sad to say, but I did get a pretty cute one of three of the four cousins! May they ALWAYS love each other the way they love each other now!! It melts my heart!

All Things Princess

Maggie is into all things princess right now-she LOVES to dress up with her buddies and I LOVE it! One day she went over to Adelaide's and came back all dressed up. She and Adelaide must have tried on every, single princess dress in her closet before picking the very best ones. Then, her 8-yr old neighbor fixed their hair to be fit only for royalty! They were SO proud to show me their new looks!





These are a few pictures from Allison's Princess Party at A Tiny Kingdom. They sang karaoke, made cupcakes, got their nails painted, got glittered from a fairy, made stuffed animals, dressed up the birthday princess, and had a royal time! I absolutely LOVE this age!




Posing with her daddy before the party! Love this picture!

Sister Time

One unusually warm Sunday in February, we spent the entire day in the yard-in short sleeves!! The girls had worn their matching Madeline dresses to church, and they were having such a great time playing in the play house. I grabbed my camera and tried to get a few good shots.

Hard to capture them together these days...



This is how MA feels about posing with a death grip from Big Sister!



This girl is getting so big-much happier with her independence...



Then came the fussies, so the paci came out again!



Maggie pretending to like the rope swing that she is deathly afraid of...so she decided to push her "babies".



Mary Allison chilling...so serious!



A typical look I get from Maggie when I ask her to smile for the camera!



Little did I know that would NOT be the last warm day we'd have in February! What a great winter this was!!

On the Move...Busy, Busy, Busy

Shortly after her first birthday, Mary Allison started to walk behind a riding toy. She was SO fun to watch and oh so proud of herself! Yes, I had her in Christmas pajamas, but you have to capture the magic when you can capture the magic. She would go and go until she'd run into a wall or table or whatever-then, she'd wait for me to turn her around and start her back up. All that movement, yet, everytime I pulled out the video camera, she froze! It took me weeks to capture it...thus is life!

Enjoying the Playhouse with Friends

Without further adieu, here's the playhouse...insert heavenly chorus song here! It turned out just perfect. I hope the kids enjoy the heck out of it and make many, many lasting memories!

In this picture, Maggie is hard at work with her housekeeping duties...she must have swept 200 times...cracks me up! These pictures were taken on move in day. We had beautiful weather that week, so we spent one day finishing up. Santa also brought them a three piece kitchen to put out there...and painted one wall with chalkboard paint...and put some pictures of them and their friends on the wall.



Adelaide and her family came over that afternoon for a visit! I just love having them as neighbors and friends.



Santa brought them their very own pink rocking chairs-Mary Allison is really into rocking these days. She sits in any and every chair and tries to make it rock-considering that's one of my favorite activities, I'll go ahead and say she gets that from me.



Santa also put two rope swings next to the house-despite the look on Maggie's face, she really is proud-that girl loves to swing!



Maggie in her rocking chair-I think she's pleased...what do you think?



If you ask Maggie what Santa brought her for Christmas, she'll tell you My Little Ponies...typical! If you ask Robby, he'll tell you that Santa brought us a new mother in law suite...HA! Good times!

Happy Birthday Sweet Mary Allison

Once again, I find myself way behind on my blogging-shocker!! I wrote this text before her first birthday on January 3rd, and never posted. Now that she is FIFTEEN months, I reread this and couldn't help but laugh at how much has changed with her in just three months! But, for the sake of keeping good records, below is about my Mary Allison when she turned ONE! A lot of text, so feel free to skip to the next post with more pictures.



I cannot believe a year has already come and gone...this year was, by far, the fastest one in my life! I LOVE this baby girl-she is so laid back and easy going, and I couldn't have wished for an easier baby. She is the epitome of happiness...unless she is hungry, sick, or sleepy!

A few things I want to remember about her at this milestone:

LOVES her pink blanket-as a baby, she would literally cover her face with loveys in the bed! It made me a nervous wreck, but that was her thing. It has evolved into loving the mess out of this blanket. Thankfully, I have a backup blanket that is equally as loved-that one goes to school and church, and while it's not her #1 love, it does the job. She also loves her paci!

Has recently started standing up-not even thinking about walking, but she's getting stronger on her feet everyday. As for me, I am not disappointed because I want her to slow down!

Loves her sister-LOVES her to pieces, but she has learned to voice her opinion. She doesn't love her sister taking things away from her or getting into her face. It cracks me up that she has no shame in pulling Maggie's hair to let her know she's unhappy...funny girl!

Mary Allison struggles with acid reflux? We didn't catch it until she was 9 months old-didn't seem to give her too much trouble as a newborn, but for whatever reason, she started getting fussy with real food at 6 months and by 9, she was very uncomfortable. She's now on medication and soy milk and seems to be MUCH happier!

Has also had a tough few months with teething! This baby had only the bottom two front teeth for months, and has all of a sudden cut SIX new teeth! She's not having too much fun with it, but they have mostly cut through, so she's well on her way!

Has the most infectious laugh-melts my heart!

Loves school! This baby girl rarely cries when she is there, and while I can't seem to rock her to sleep at home, Ms. Nancy has no trouble getting a catnap from her there. She is so happy there, and that makes mama happy!

Loves her Daddy to death, but so far, she's a mama's girl! I can get her to snuggle much more than Maggie ever did, and I LOVE it!

Says hello in two ways-either points her finger at the person she's talking to and gets a big 'ol smile on her face OR puts the palm of her hand to her ear like she's talking on the phone!

On that note, she talks a LOT, but still doesn't make too much sense. Other than mama and dada, her first words were "good girl" and "bubbles". HA! She says good girl constantly, and repeats it a million times. LOVES bubbles in the bathtub!

To that, she thoroughly enjoys bath time and, if I let her, she will completely soak the bathroom in five seconds flat! She LOVES to splash-toys are not necessary in her world!

That goes for our play time too...she loves toys, but is far more of a troublemaker than her sister was. She will play with a toy for a few minutes, but then she is off for the outlets, breakables, lamps, roaches on the floor, liquor cabinet...you name it! I've put the padding around our fire place, and she absolutely makes a game of pulling them off as soon as she notices them. She is a mess-childproofing has been hard with her. Thankfully, she has another set of eyes watching her almost constantly! She's such a mess!!

Food is daily challenge. She is such a great eater 90% of the time, but if she's not interested, she doesn't hesitate to throw each and every tiny piece onto the floor-she's such a messy eater! As of this week, veggies are out and chicken is in! On a daily basis, she loves milk (of the soy variety), yogurt, and all fruits. She's not a fan of cheese and most veggies other than sweet potatoes and green beans. She loves some carbs-goldfish, crackers, chips, you name it! She's not crazy about pastas.

Might be my musician-loves music! Loves to dance when she hears it and even sings along with us at church! Sweetness!

Loves the stroller, which is great, because she spends an awful lot of time in it. She really enjoys being outside like the rest of us too!

As far as stats go, I'm not sure where she is on anything other than weight, but since we've been at the doctors office 5 times in the last 3 months, I can tell you she weighs 20 pounds. At 9 months that put her at 75% but not sure at 12 months where she'll fall! I find it particularly humorous that she currently weighs 6 pounds less than her 3 1/2 year old sister-I could eat those precious cheeks and rolls UP!

Happy Happy First Birthday to my sweet baby girl!

Attempting the Christmas Card...FAILURE!

After TOO many failed attempts at perfection, I finally decided to nix the Christmas card this year. I am so sad it happened that way, but I kept putting it off and putting it off, waiting for the perfect picture, and by the time it happened, I was too pressed for time. SO, it is what it is. When I was looking through pictures to put on the blog, I came across plenty that would have worked, but to me, one or the other was just refusing to cooperate. I thought I'd share a few with you!











This was the winner...so, friends who are reading this...no fear, you were NOT cut from my Christmas card list this year. If i was going to send a card, this is what it would have looked like!



Merry Christmas from the Hayes Family!

Christmas in Sylacauga

The girls and I made THREE trips to Jackson between the first of November and the fifth of December...whew!!! So, needless to say, we decided to stay put this year for Christmas. As much as I miss my family (always) it was SO great to not travel! I really wanted to put an emphasis on family this Christmas, and I think we accomplished that-spending time both with our core family unit, and our extended family. Most of Robby's mom's family lives in and around Birmingham, but we never get to see them...so, we were thrilled when Robby's aunt invited us to her home in Sylacauga for cocktails...we had a blast!

Mags obviously knows her GIRL cousins in Jackson, but she hasn't really been able to spend much time around her BOY cousins on Robby's side of the family. They picked right up as if they'd been friends forever. She LOVED them and even told Robby on the way home that she "really liked his cousins". HA-she still can't grasp how they can be her cousins too...we'll work on that!

All of the cousins accounted for-three boys and three girls...love it!



Love this picture of Mary Margaret and Mary Allison-Mary Margaret is the oldest of Robby's first cousins, and she is awesome...so much fun! Maggie, for some reason, would never warm up to her, and it has always surprised me-Mary Allison, however, thought she was hilarious! Now that Mary Allison has OK'd her, Mags has finally warmed up...HA!



Most of the first cousins (on this side)!

CHRISTMAS!!

Christmas finally came...and Santa visited! I love that blazing fire in the background!



Maggie had a blast going through her sister's stocking...and hers...and opening all of our presents! She still insists that Santa meant to bring HER the My Little Pony training toothbrush and toothpaste. Ughhh-older sisters (that's for you, Maggie Wilson!!)



St. Nick sent the girls on a short Christmas Morning scavenger hunt in search of their BIG gift-this was after clue #2...her attention span was really short because she was ready to go back through her indoor loot, but she hung in there with us!



Putting on her raincoat at Santa's instruction-it was a cold, rainy, nasty morning in Birmingham, but she was a trooper-not a lot of pictures were taken from here because I was holding Mary Allison and trying to keep her dry while Robby filmed Maggie on the video camera. The big surprise was a PLAYHOUSE for the girls...custom built by lots of special, amazing, precious elves, who must be the kindest souls I know (or don't know). They worked until the bad weather cut them off, but luckily Santa left a long to-do list for us to complete after Christmas. So, more to come on the playhouse! Her first words, after a big old smile, were..."well, Dad...it's not a treehouse!" Well, Maggie, you are right, but Santa had no idea you even knew what a treehouse was!



Back inside, Mary Allison (and her humidity induced curly hair), was starting to feel the spirit of Christmas-so she immediately reclaimed her My Little Pony training toothpaste!



And called a few friends to wish them a Merry Merry...one of my favorite tricks! She and Maggie BOTH became experts on cell phone etiquette early, I am ashamed to admit...must have learned that from their daddy! :)



Mimi and Papa came to see what Santa brought...




And Belle and G-daddy sent this activity table-she LOVES it! Couldn't even wait to get it out of the box...HA!



We thoroughly enjoyed our Christmas morning at home...just the four of us...relaxing, playing, and eating too much! Later that night, however, we headed to Robby's parent's house for some time with the uncles, aunts, and grands. We ate a delicious meal and enjoyed a leisurely afternoon over there too! Maggie wasted no time playing cars with her Papa.


And Uncle Andrew (and William too) picked right up and flew the kids all over the house, airplane style, and played with the girls too. Those girls love their uncles!!!



It was an absolutely AMAZING Christmas...we are so blessed beyond measure! I hope you had the merriest of Christmases!!