Disney on Ice - Dare to Dream

We took our Princess Zoe to see Disney on Ice last weekend and boy were we glad we did! It was SO much fun! Scott got home on Friday afternoon from being gone for three weeks and we had tickets to go to the show that Saturday afternoon. We didn't tell Zoe until the night before and of course she didn't really understand what we were talking about but that's all that she's talked about since! "The Princess Show" is what we call it. She doesn't watch a lot of TV but has recently gotten into Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (usually holds her attention for 10 minutes or so) and on the weekends I'll play Tangled or Princess and the Frog and just kinda have it on while we're doing stuff and playing and she'll watch it off and on. Dare to Dream is Rapunzel, Cinderella and Princess Tiana. So Z was familiar with all three of them. In between each show Mickey, Minnie, Donald and Goofy came out. THIS was exciting stuff!!! For all of us! Since Zoe love Mickey Mouse Clubhouse the most she was super stoked. She said "I watch him at home!" And "Where's the other Mickey?" -- That's what she calls Minnie Mouse. :)

We will most definitely be going back to more Disney on Ice shows as they come to town. It was more than worth the money to see Zoe's excitement! Just SO MUCH FUN.

Money=Happiness? FALSE

This morning on my way to work while contemplating if I should go through chick fil a and spend $5 on breakfast I had some serious deep thoughts. I was raised to understand that money doesn't make you happy and that it's the small things in life that are the real ones. Family has always been so important to me. Sure, we all have to work to provide for our families.. but how much are we willing to sacrifice? My husband has to travel every now and then and sometimes for weeks at a time but at the end of the day we know that what's most important to us is that the majority of the time he is at home every night with us. He doesn't want a job where he has to travel and be away from his family. We love being HOME and TOGETHER.

I've recently taken quite a pay cut and was more than willing to make that sacrifice. I'd choose getting Z early from daycare, going to the park or pet store for free on a Friday over sitting at work until 6 on a Friday and missing out on those moments ANY day. Life is just way too short and our kids really grow up in the blink of an eye. I don't want to look back and wish I would've spent more time with her or done something differently. No, I can't afford to be a stay at home mom. For money or sanity reasons. HA! Kudos to you stay at home mommies! But as I sit here at work this morning, my co worker is at a Mommy and Me Tea party with her kids and going to Kindergarten Round-up, missing a morning of work because she chooses to put her family first as does our boss. Those are things I SO look forward to doing with my baby as she grows up. I don't want to miss a thing. Of course life happens and there may be times that I can't be there. But I want her to grow up knowing that Mommy and Daddy made sacrifices to give her the best life possible. Not money, toys and pretty things, but lots of time, love and fun times. Those pretty things will one day be ugly, the toys will break, the money always disappears, but LOVE and LIFE experiences are priceless.

Happy Mother's Day weekend to all you hard working Mama's!!! We have the toughest and most rewarding job there is, no doubt! :)

Traveling buddies

On our way home from Carlisle on Sunday after visiting the Kelly's for the weekend, we stopped in Arkadelphia. My baby brother, Luke, is just finishing up his first year of school there and has recently moved into a house with a couple of friends. We thought we'd stop and treat the broke college kid to lunch and check out his new place. Zoe was pretty excited to see him but a little indifferent because I had to wake her from her nap to eat lunch and play. She eventually liven up..of course! His house is the perfect bachelor pad. Enough said. HA! No, really, it's cute and perfect for some college guys. I couldn't be happier for him because he's excited about it and happy to be out of the dorm. (I can't get my pictures uploaded from my iphone to rotate the correct way and loaded onto my blog that way! *Frustrated* ) After we visited with Uncle Luke we went on to Texarkana to play with Nana and Papa. We had so much fun we just couldn't leave! So we stayed the night. :) Of course my perfect plan of Z sleeping the whole way home Monday morning since we had to leave so early did NOT happen. Oh well! It was still a perfect weekend! And with Daddy coming home in just 4 short days I wasn't going to let anything get us down.

Arkansas Trip!

This past weekend us two girls took a little road trip! This was the furthest I've driven with just me and Zoe. She did pretty good because I tried to time most of the driving around nap time. It was a little stressful at times but over all we had a great trip and I think Zoe had a lot of fun! We left Friday at noon and headed straight to good ole Carlisle, Arkansas to see my best friend, Whitney. She and her husband built a new house a couple of years ago and it was my first time to go see them in their new home. Whitney has been so good to come visit us in Louisiana several times since Zoe's been born and I thought it was finally time for us to visit them! We LOVED getting to just hang around with Whit and Matt and their sweet lab, Kate. Zoe was/is obsessed with Kate. She didn't want Matt or Kate out of her site! Silly girl. Whitney thinks Z needs a puppy. We think we'll just stick to visiting Kate :) Zoe did a great job of breaking in their beautiful new home AND getting it ready for their new lives with their new baby boy coming soon!!! She had toys, blocks, puzzle pieces and books everywhere! Saturday night we went to dinner at a restaurant in Little Rock called All Aboard. It had trains on tracks above the restaurant that would bring you your food. Zoe thought this was the coolest thing ever! The food was great, beer was good and company the best! Shuggie met up with us for dinner and to get some Zoe lovin' and see her in her true form--acting wild in a restaurant! It was a great, kid friendly environment so I didn't stress over it too much. I was so happy we got to visit with Matt, Whitney and Shuggie and Shuggie's man, Broc, for awhile. Next stop on our Arkansas tour was Arkadelphia the Texarkana. I will blog about those when I have more time! HAPPY HUMP DAY!!!

HELLO!

Hi! It's me. Soo... long time no see. I've recently started a new career and now have more time to myself and for my family and much less stress and could not be happier! Since this change I have found myself constantly checking other peoples blogs and missing blogging myself. I have so many times thought about coming back to the blog world not only because it's fun but because my little Zoe has grown up WAY too quickly and I need to document her life. We have SO much fun with our sweet girl and I don't want to miss or forget a thing! There's absolutely no way to catch you up on the past two years of her life so for now I'll just show off some really cute pictures then pick up from there. :)

Zoe's nursery

Finally, I got to "nest" when Zoe was about 8 weeks old! I had a blast doing her nursery and she loves it! It was the only room I cared anything about when we moved in. I got on it right away, painting and fixing it up!
Rewind a few months.. Our first adventures with Miss Z!

Week 1: in Texarkana at mom and dad's
Week 2-3: in a hotel on base in Shreveport
Week 4-5: living with aunt and uncle in Shreveport
Week 6: back in Texarkana at mom and dad's and Scott driving back and forth every night after work.
Week 7: FINALLY closed on our home!!!
Week 8: moving, unpacking, Zoe started daycare
Week 9: I started work

We couldn't be more grateful to be in our home and back to "normal"!!!



Daddy putting crib together






Bookshelves were given by someone who wanted to get rid of them. I spray painted them blue, they were white. Love them! And the picture above the shelves is a gift from Uncle Doc. When he brought it to us it made me tear up! There's deep meaning to his drawing, but I won't go on about that..
The little rocking chair was Zoe's great great grandmother's when she was a baby! How cool is that? Trying to decide if we want to paint it or leave it.







Since I've been working on this post, Zoe rolled over from her back to tummy for the first time and I missed it!!! :( Next blog post will have to be during nap time so I don't miss anything.

3 months isn't that long..

I CAN NOT BELIEVE I HAVE BEEN SO LAZY ABOUT THIS!
Okay, first off, confession. I have been too lazy, tired and busy to even get my computer out and see if I could bum the internet off a neighbor. UNTIL TONIGHT. I haven't opened my computer since Zoe was born. We don't have internet, television or phone yet (and may not for awhile) so I just haven't even bothered with it...
I don't even know where to start! But I'll keep this one short and sweet then catch up on pictures and fun stuff later.
We are settled into our home and love it in Bossier! I have a job and it's going good and we absolutely LOVE Zoe's daycare. Scott is work on base two weekends a month for the next few months so we stay here in Bossier most weekends and our families are here a lot of weekends. Since he's working so many Sundays we haven't found a church yet but have visited the one Z goes to daycare at and will be visiting again.
Zoe is an absolute JOY. We are crazy about her and don't know what we did before her. (blog, maybe?) She is at such a fun age right now! I swear she does something new every week!
If you are my friend on FB you've definitely kept up with me. All thanks to mobile upload pictures. I really should be ashamed of myself, but life is just busy! In the meantime, here's some Zoe love :)