Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Yippee!

 Zane is Three!yippee

Zane turned three years old on December 27th and had two birthday parties to celebrate!

Zane Bell is kind of known for his boots. He wore them all summer with his shorts. Given the choice, he picks boots every time. When he was dressed like Woody for about two weeks straight back in October, it became apparent that he would be having a ‘Cowboy’ birthday party.familyThe past two years we have had the party at our house in Little Rock and invited our families to drive up from Hampton and down from Conway. Although having a birthday two days after Christmas makes planning a party a little difficult, it also has it’s benefits. Ok, just one benefit that I can think of, and that is that we were already in Arkansas!

We had the first party in Conway on Dec 23rd. We had hot dogs, chips & dip, baked beans, and cupcakes. DeeDee & I handmade the cute cupcake toppers. Yeah, right. She found them on etsy.  doggies1doggiescupcakes1cupcakes2I found these cowboy boot ornaments on clearance the day of the party. I think I’ll start Zane his own Christmas tree in his room and use ornaments from his birthday parties. I have monkey ornaments from his first birthday and tractors from his second birthday. bootsTrusty old Butterscotch held a sign welcoming everyone to the party. We also put up pictures of our cute little cowboy, and a pair of DeeDee’s boots from when she was a little girl.butterscotchpicsentryI found these cute candles at HobLob to put in his cupcake. A cowboy hat, sheriff’s badge, and cowboy boot. So, I lit the candles and we sang happy birthday. Apparently the wax had plenty of time to pool in the cowboy boot during our serenade. Result—birthday boy blows out the candles and hot wax splashes back into his face! Birthday party FAIL! Oops. Series of pics…candle1candle2candle3candle4              Trail mix party favors. “Happy Trails”trail,ix1cheesepicnikWe couldn’t let Zane’s actual birthday go by without doing something for him, so we had another party in Hampton! My brother had to work and couldn’t stay for the party, but he made sure that Zane had an AWESOME birthday boot cake! And it didn’t taste like boot at all :) It was delicious! Is this not incredible?!bootcake1Zane saw lit candles and said, “Noooo! I don’t want to!” I held him & promised he wouldn’t get hurt again.candlesagainThe birthday boy and some of his party guests…lindseyHollinrico1z&hunterz&h    When it came time to blow out the candles, Zane said, “NO! I don’t want to!” I had to convince him that they wouldn’t hurt him this time!

Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Christmas 2011

 mom&zanepicnikHollin’s arrival into this world (and my maternity leave) came at a great time! For the first time, I didn’t have to worry about being off of work for the holidays. Very convenient, considering that we had a little bit further to travel this year. The kids and I were able to spend 18 days in Arkansas for Thanksgiving and 13 days for Christmas. Sounds like a long time, but somehow I still wasn’t able to see everyone that I wanted to. Matt was there for about four days for Christmas and over a week for Thanksgiving. IMG_4065It was great to spend time with family and friends. We were spoiled with too many presents and too much food. And very grateful for all of it.mom&hollinpicnikhollinpicnikSanta came to Conway & brought Z a trunk of costumes.woody pirateHollin got some cute clothes and a chair for her room.hollinschairAnd just when we thought we owned every toy ever made, we headed to Hampton where we were proven wrong.tractors Of course, he enjoyed playing in the ice chest best.icechest                               Sweet girlhollin                 Sweet babies with Mammaw AliceIMG_4127      The day after Christmas was not Matt’s best day. IMG_4134 No, he didn’t get into Zane’s costumes…this is a make-shift eye patch he wore after Zane accidentally poked him in the eye and caused a corneal abrasion. I was really worried because he had to drive 900 miles home the next day. By himself. And eyes are pretty important for driving. Thankfully, he got some medicine and was much better the next day.

There’s a commercial running right now…I think for AllState. They play the theme song from Cheers. “Sometimes you wanna go Where everybody knows your name. And they’re always glad you came. You wanna go where you can see Troubles are all the same. You wanna go where everybody knows your name.” Pulls at my heart strings right now. You don’t realize how true that is until you move to a place where no one knows your name. But that’s another story. 

Here are a few kiddos that know my name.2011-12-24_10-46-55_8282011-12-24_21-53-27_7012011-12-20_11-54-42_799

 

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

‘that airplane lady’

 

2011-12-18_09-34-39_817

Traveling with an almost three-year old and a nine week old…alone. Scary. But I did it and lived to tell about it. Honestly, it couldn’t have gone any smoother.

We had to leave the house at 4:30am and drive to Milwaukee to catch our 6:55am flight. We cut it close, the security line was slow moving, and I got a little nervous that we weren’t going to make it. Zane could’ve just walked through, but he wanted to take his shoes off, too (of course) and they made him take off his fleece. I had to fold up the stroller to put it through the metal detector, dress/undress Zane, take off/put on my shoes, all while Hollin was attached to me in the Moby wrap. Because she was all wrapped up on me, they required me to have my hands tested (for chemicals?…not sure). Needless to say, these things slowed us down. But we ended up making it to our gate in plenty of time, and for some reason there were only TWENTY people on our flight. This meant we could take up as much space as we wanted.

Zane chose the very first row. Once we sat down he told me he needed help with his seatbelt. I told him I would help him. “NO. I want that airplane lady help me.” He later told her he needed help. She had a three-year old grandson, so she was pretty smitten with Zane. Later he said, “I wanna tell that airplane lady something.” She wasn’t around so I’m not sure what he was gonna tell her. When she asked if he wanted a drink he said, “No, I fine. You have pretzels for me.”

He fell asleep right before we landed (of course) and the flight attendants were SO helpful with getting the stroller and him into it, getting my carry-ons, etc.

Our next flight was really empty, too. Hollin barely made a peep the whole time. And was the cutest little flyer.IMG_3988 IMG_3987All that morning traveling required a peaceful afternoon nap underneath the Christmas tree.IMG_3971

Christmas in Madison

 santa2011Santa found out that we were going to be in Arkansas during Christmas, so he made an early stop in Madison on the night of December 16th! He not only brought presents….santa2he brought some snow from the North Pole, too!2011-12-17_09-08-45_295 Zane got every Cars 2 character imaginable, an “ipad” (Innotab), and other goodies.chrismtasmorning christmasmorning12011-12-17_09-08-07_734 Hollin got some boots, leg warmers, hair bands, etc.2011-12-17_09-05-36_795 Santa left a trail of M&Ms from Zane’s room allll the way down the stairs into the living room. Zane chanted, “Fol.low.me!” all the way down.mms2The night before we left Santa some milk and cookies and a note from Zane and a carrot for the reindeer. Zane had ‘snowmen’ ham & cheese for dinner!cookiescookiesforsanta1noteforsantasnowmanfood2snowmanfoodAfter all of the ‘Christmas’ morning excitement, we packed our bags. We had to leave at 4:30am on Sunday to catch our flight to Arkansas!