I Won a Book!

So if you didn't already know, I am a habitual blog reader.  I have like 100 blogs that I follow, and while I may not read every article every day, it does make me happy to have so many fun articles to choose from daily.  One of my favorite blogs is Snarky Mommy.  She is HILARIOUS!  The way she talks about her kids is how I feel everyday at school and home.

 Anyway, I won a contest on her blog!  I am now the happy owner of  Over My Dead Potty.  WOOHOO!  You can see me nanosecond of fame here:  Snarky Mommy

Cheers and thanks Snarky Mommy for the book.  I can't wait to read it!

The Pumpkin Patch {2013}

We took Emmy to the pumpkin patch again this year. One of the local sororities puts it on, and they really go all out setting up little photo areas and games for the kids.







For the first little while, Emmy was not being super cooperative, and a little part of me was very scared that I might just spank her in front of everyone.  Luckily Bradley was with me, so he took over for a few minutes so I could cool down.   We gave her a snack and moved on.















We met up with some friends and family along the way.







We saw Cameron.









We saw Jackson.







We saw Ava.





We saw ABBY!  I think seeing her BFF produced the biggest smiles.  Unfortunately, this was the best one that I got of both of them.  Better luck next year girls!



We took a family picture, but unfortunately this was during the time when Emmy wasn't really feeling the whole photo and hay thing.  Maybe next year I will let her wear jeans so that she can sit on a hay bale without crying.



She was a little scared of the scarecrow this year. The pictures got progressively closer to tears with each frame.





At some point, she found these glasses in my bag, and she let me know that she was done.  It was time to go home.



It was a fun day, and I am very grateful that these ladies put together such an awesome event for our community. :)

Emmy's Escapades

Here are just a few things that my darling daughter has been up to lately. 

-Emmy got kissed at daycare.  Apparently a little boy came up and put his arm around her shoulders and kissed her cheek. I don't know she reacted, but apparently another boy in the class body checked him and yelled "NO KISSING."  That kid is my hero.

 -Emmy got put at the sad face picture (this would require a whole post on its own) for throwing blocks.  Supposedly there was another kid that was throwing blocks too, and when the teacher told them to stop, Emmy kept throwing.  She didn't care too much about getting put in SAD until they told her that they were going to tell her Mommy how she had been acting.  This produced real tears.  (Score- Mommy 1, Emmy-0)

-The director of Emmy's school was helping pass out lunch plates the other day in the classroom.  Emmy gets a plate of Chicken Parmesan put down in front of her.  She looks at it and says "Is this mine?  Wow."  Awestruck like she has never been given a plate of food before.  (Score- Mommy 1, Emmy-1)



-As you may or may not know, Emmy likes to "tell stories" (apparently if you call your 2 year old a liar, you are a bad Mom).  Emmy was petting the new puppy at Mom's house.  He jumped into her lap and tried to lick her face.  She ran away saying the puppy wanted to eat her face.  I am not really sure where she gets this stuff.

-Emmy  got to pay another visit to SAD for climbing on the play kitchen at school.  For those of you who are counting, that's twice in one week.  We are super proud parents.

-Emmy got a new car seat for my car, and I had to install it myself.  I tried to install it in the middle rear facing, but I could not get it tight enough.  I just put it forward facing, and I thought I would get Bradley to fix it the next day.  I kind of forgot, so she was still riding like that the next day when we were on our way to get some dinner.  Bradley was "driving like he stole it" and whipped around a corner.  Emmy's seat leaned way over sideways and she yelled "WHOA."  It. Was. Hilarious.  (If you can get passed the really dangerous part where her seat was not installed correctly)  We have it all fixed now, so don't go calling Johnny Law on us. ;)



-To continue on in the theme of car seat stories, Emmy had another fun moment riding in the car with Nana.  Nana was driving a little quickly, and she drove over a bump in the road a little fast.  Emmy got jostled in the car, and said, "Nana's going too fast!  Too fast!"  Yes Emmy we all usually agree with you.

-We have been eating a restaurant in Lousie called Britt's a lot lately.  There isn't a whole lot on the regular menu that Emmy likes, so she gets to order chili cheese tator tots if she is good.   Brad went to grab one of her tator tots. She pulled the plate away and said, "Those are mine. Don't touch them." I don't know where she gets all this stinginess when it comes to food.

-Emmy grabbed Bradley when he was trying to sleep and said, "Push" while pushing his face.  He did not find it amusing.  I thought it was hilarious.  Different strokes for different folks I guess.

-Emmy grabbed Bradley while he was sleeping and said, "Tickle tickle." The funny part is that  she can actually tickle now.  Bradley was not amused.  I guess the moral of that story is that maybe he shouldn't try to go to sleep before the baby.

-Emmy told Bradley "Wake up lazy."  I may call him Lazy Bones too often.  My bad.

Family Funday at the Houston Zoo

My Aunt J won tickets to the Houston Zoo this spring.  She thought that she would take the kids to go see all the animals at some point this summer, but it just didn't work out.  So she decided to give her four tickets to us. We have wanted to take Emmy back to the Houston Zoo for a while, so it was perfect.

When I told Mom about the tickets, one of her coworkers gave her another four tickets that she had won.  We now had eight tickets, so we could invite friends for our free trip to the zoo!

So in the end our group consisted of: Bradley, Emmy, myself, Mom, Dad, Britt, Donald Ray, Susan, and Jackson!  We left El Campo mid-afternoon, so we could beat the crowds and the heat.

Before we made it into the zoo, Dad wanted to take the kids for a ride on the train.  Brad and I decided to stay behind with our stroller, so we walked over to a scenic part of the park and waited for them to come around the bend.



Emmy loved the train!  Everytime she heard it throughout the day, she would ask to go ride the "choo choo" again.

Once we got into the zoo, we of course had to get our drink and snack situation figured out.

We also took time to take a couple of group pictures.

We didn't plan out a specific route because it was already too late in the day to see any of the baths, feedings, or trainer talks.  We just walked around and stopped when we got to something we wanted to look at.



































































When we got to the edge of Africa, we saw the carousel.  I had forgotten that it was there, and we knew the kids (big and little) would enjoy it.  My mom didn't care to ride, so we made her the photographer of the ride.





















Emmy had so much fun.

Once we had finished riding the carousel, we were pretty much done with the zoo.  It was the perfect zoo trip.  It wasn't too crowded, the heat wasn't extreme, and there was plenty of room for the kids to run and play.  Thanks Aunt J for the tickets!!

We also went to Shoguns afterwards.  Dinner was excellent.


It was really just a lovely day with amazing people. :)