Family in town

Since I've been so busy editing photos of other people other than my family, I couldn't remember the last time I pulled out my camera with my kids!  

I did a session for my sweet friend, Mary, & her family last week.

After having two sweet boys, she was excited to reveal the gender of her baby girl on the way!

Then I met a wonderful lady & did some photos in her neighborhood this week.  The views were pretty amazing.

I remembered to pull out my camera the last few days with Matt's Nana & Aunt Nancy in town to capture my own family.  I wasn't able to get any photos of Connor though, since he was in school both days.  Here are some photos from our adventures the last few days...

My littlest water boy enjoys our mornings when we venture the other kiddie fountains, have a snack, then head home for a nice nap!

This little bug is growing ever so quickly lately.  He's still thoroughly obsessed with his ABCs, has learned how to count to 10, and adores his big brother like crazy.

He's my 'I do it myself' child.  Its great to have your child grow up to be independent, strong-willed & determined, but man, its a booger to raise them when they're kids.

Fancy Nance is always a hit with the kids!  Connor soaked up his super hero toy playtime with her pretty quickly & wants to know when we get to have Auntie Nancy come visit again! :)  She is a joy to have around!

Noah giving his Poppy some love.

We also took a little trip to the Four Mile Cove to see what it was all about, considering I used to pass it on the bridge almost every day since I was younger & never stopped to check it out.  

It offered some pretty photo views, but not so exciting with the wildlife spottings.  It was a nice, quiet walk, so it was enjoyable!

Noah was scoping out the water for fish!

These two. :)

The little Monster enjoyed himself, so it was a successful morning!

Easter

My littlest bunny decided to wake at 5:30am in an outright cry.  I'm almost guaranteed a night waking with Noah on the night's he's been with a babysitter.  It's great & all that he missed me & needs just one good cuddle before going back to sleep, but it's also nice when he sleeps through the night!  I managed to get him back to sleep, but I was now too awake to go back to sleep.  I opted to edit Katie's wedding pictures while I waited for my boys to wake.  Connor was cuter than anything walking into my room at 7:00am chipper and loud, "Happy Easter, Mom!" and "Happy Easter, Matt!"  He went on to say, "I prayed on my way down the stairs and thanked God for holidays.  I love holidays!"  Is he not the cutest?!

C scoped out his Easter pile from us (this year it included Avengers swimwear, Bebop from the Ninja Turtles, 'Surprise Eggs,' and a 'Blind Box' with an Avengers character in it).  C is all into the blind box phenomenon that is going around among all 5-7 year olds.  You basically buy a toy in a box, but don't know what it is until you open it.  He was THRILLED to see his box contained Spiderman, since he claims it's his favorite character these days.

Once the Noah Monster was up, we headed outside on our egg hunt.  C got to claim the goods in all the eggs this year, but pretty sure Noah will want in on the egg fillers next Easter.

Side note:  Noah had no idea the bunny ears were on his head.  He wore them for a good 20 minutes.  Once he ran and felt something flop around on his head, they were off & never returned again.  It was cute while it lasted!

We played basketball outside & had a nice, lazy day around the house.  After Noah woke from his nap, we headed to Nana & Papa's for more Easter fun.  C looks forward to his tradional Easter water balloon hunt.  His main target this year was his new Uncle Eric.

Noah sprung a hole in his water balloon & got a kick out of the tiny squirt hole in it!

This kid was full of giggles.

Welcome to the family, Uncle Eric.

Some very well dressed babies.

And the prettiest lab you ever did see.  Love you Bobo.

Katie's married!

The weather was fabulous!  The venue was beautiful!  The bride was stunning!  The details were perfect!  It was an amazing wedding & weekend.

The rehearsal

Wedding day!

Matt & I were sweating pre-wedding while trying to keep the Monster busy before the ceremony.  Let's just say I had no reservations sending him on his way after the ceremony back to our house with Aunt Debbie!  He's a busy kid.

This shall be framed in my home soon.  I could eat him up.

Goob.

The best I could get of the busy bee.

BFFs :)

It's amazing how great you feel with your makeup & hair done.  Fake eyelashes are beyond incredible.  Oh, to have my own stylists every day!

I dare you to find their flaws.  Seriously, perfection.

The details were so beautiful.  I wish I capture more of them.  She had the neatest 'guest book' that was a tree, where everyone signed a leaf.  There was a 'Sparkler Send Off' corner to let guests know we'd be do sparklers at 10:30pm to send the bride & groom on their way.  The dessert table was SO good.  I even ate grouper for dinner & LOVED it.  Yeah, the wedding was incredible.

A toast from Dad :)

My good looking parents (and pretty Aunt Kris too)!

We had such a good night celebrating!

Here's to the new Mr. & Mrs. Brewer!

Busy Busy Busy!

This past week was Connor's Spring Break.  It felt amazing to not a have nightly routine, have Connor home with me all week & weekends, and just get to spend some time with my boys.

While I know we were super busy, I had my hands full taking pictures of other families, so didn't pull my camera out much with my own boys.  I did, however, take my camera on one of our excursions to explore the Six Mile Cypress Slough.  While Connor & Michael got a kick out of finding cardinals, I was busy juggling a crazy toddler near large, open boardwalks above a swamp.  All while slugging along my camera to capture the beautiful moments!  It was an adventure for all!

C & Noah really bonded together this week.  Noah walks up randomly to Connor to give him big, open-mouthed kisses.  He plops down in Connor's lap to sit & watch him play video games.  They frolic around the house laughing at each other too.  My heart was full this week. :) 

Family Vacation 2015

To kick off our Spring Break, we ventured to Universal & Islands of Adventure with the Goobers!

Best choice of our trip--renting a van.

Will I ever buy a van? No.

Did I love the endless space & automatic doors? You betcha!

Both boys enjoyed the movies played on the DVD player, as well as having all the snacks for our trip within arms reach.

(C and I call eachother 'eye twins.'  His eyes are always amazing in pictures.  Love him so!)

This goon was supposed to nap for the whole drive there, but opted for a quick cat nap then was recharged for movie time and endless snacking.

Whatever Noah saw Connor eat, he had to have some too.

The Pringle Monster.

Side note:  Why is there not a vacuum extension invented for the sides of carseats?  Chip crumbs are the devil.

Oh & this Smarty Pants knows how to navigate the Ipad on his own.   It's really the oddest thing seeing such a tiny person use technology without assistance.

If Matt had a say, we'd own a minivan.  He loved it!

When we arrived at the hotel, the boys enjoyed a good bath together.  Big brother gets a kick out of messing with the Noah Monster.  C always takes full responsibility for teaching Noah how to identify and say his numbers from 1-10.  Having siblings is great!

The next day we took on Islands of Adventure & Universal allllllll day.  Since C is so much into the Avengers right now, I was happy to see he was tall enough to go on some of the super hero rides, like SpiderMan ride and the Transformers Ride.  He was pumped to go on the SpiderMan ride first (simulated 3-D ride).  After being on it for a few seconds, I had a Mom Panic Moment where I realized my sweet boy may be tall enough, but it still may be too scary for him.  Sure enough, I practiced the art of 'close your eyes when you're scared' and kept talking calmly to him, reminding him it wasn't real & it was almost over.  My whole 'this is going to be the best vacation ever' started to crumble after getting off ride one.  I just kept with my upbeat Mom voice & C was just the cutest...

"Um, Mom.  I think I will really like that ride when I'm a little older.  Like 7 or something?!"

Bless his little heart.  He seems so big yet so little sometimes.

When we saw SpiderMan was there for pictures, we hopped in line.  After pictures with him, C said to me,

"I know he wasn't the real SpiderMan, but he sounded a lot like him."

We then had a short talk about even if he realizes the characters aren't real, that he needs to 'play along' for Noah's sake.

See what I mean?! Sometimes he seems so little yet seems so big sometimes.

Why must they grow up?!

But it was when we reached SuessLand, that my Mommy voids were fulfilled.  Both boys were in HEAVEN!  It was the Grinch, Sam I am, and Cat & the Hat!  The rides were fun, not scary.  The lines were short.  It was magical & I savored every last second of it!

Noah's favorite (and only) ride!  He loved the carousel!

I decided to snap a pic of the boys after lunch in SuessLand.  C was giving Matt bunny ears (or trying to) and Noah was pooping in the photo.  Kodak moments.

From there, we hopped over to Universal for some rides--faves were Despicable Me & the ET ride.  We scarfed down dinner at the NBA City restaurant there, rode a few more rides in SuessLand, and ended the day on a high note!  Noah was fast asleep before we got back to the hotel (which did super awesome things to our night's sleep...he woke ready to party from 2am-6am).  I spent the final hours of the morning holding Noah asleep in bed to catch just a few hours of sleep (since he wouldn't let me put him down).  When we got up, Matt & I must've been out-of-our-vacationing-minds when we threw out the surprise stop of Legoland on our way home!

The lines were long, C may have had a grumpy meltdown when he didn't get a carousel horse next to Noah, BUT lunch was wonderful, the boys had fun, and we ended the trip happy!

Waiting in line for lunch.  Noah has the 'innocent, but definitely guilty' face on.

A pizza buffet?!  The boys enjoyed every second of it.

(If you notice, I'm wearing strapless the entire trip.  This was my once chance to get sun (and no tan lines) before my sister's wedding in a few days.  What we didn't know was there was a cold front that came through that morning & I'm pretty sure I was the only one without proper clothing coverage for the weather conditions.  What Floridian in their right mind would think to pack jackets & sweaters to go the a theme park at the end of March?!  I was worried about everyone getting too hot.  Definitely not the case this day.  I think it was in the mid 60's.)

On our way out of the park, we spotted a giant 'W' (Noah's absolute favorite letter for some reason).  The whole trip he was pointing out letters & fascinated with all the large lettering everywhere.  We thought it was appropriate to have Noah pictured with his 'W.'  

When he realized he was on a 'W', he kept pointing and repeating "duh-doo" while I tried to get a decent picture.  Funny, odd little kid.

We hopped across the street for some Perkins dinner before hitting the road home.  We were all exhausted, but the food helped a lot!  The kids were great & the entire weekend was worth it!