I am woman!

After visiting our friends Amy and Lane for a delicious supper of mahi-mahi straight out of the water (well, almost - just add in drive time from Pensacola), Emily came home with her very first feminist propaganda T-shirt. She was so proud of her Rosie the Riveter shirt that she insisted on wearing it home from their house that night and slept in it two nights in a row before an unfortunate incident with a leaky sippy cup forced us to wash it. She likes to shout, "We can do it!" and wave her fists in the air. Move over, Gloria Steinem!

Not sure why...

In a rare moment, Emily discovered that our laundry basket was empty and decided that it would be the perfect place to play for a while. I'm not even sure how she managed to get inside without tipping it over! At any rate, she was not happy at being photographed and having her fun spoiled. I felt like a papparazzi snapping pictures of her while she angrily waved me away. Hope your summer vacation is going well!

Yarrrrr!

Before heading to the Blounts for a Memorial cookout, Emily and I played pirates for most of the day with a stash of Mardi Gras beads that she pilfered from our friends Rhonda and Adrian. We had a great time hiding our treasure all over the house and using a map to find it and dig it up. I snapped these pictures after her nap. Isn't her hair a hoot? She looks kind of Rastafarian in this dress with her big wild head. It was so wild that I had to slick it back in a ponytail to go to the Blounts. Every day with Emily's hair is some kind of adventure! Pay close attention to her necklaces - one of them is Donald's flash drive with all of his doctoral work on it. Should we keep that in a safer place?

Memorial Day with the Blounts

We spent Memorial Day with our friends Amy and Lane, as well as their dogs Jack, Gracie, and Maddie. Gracie had to spent the evening locked up in the bedroom - she was a little TOO excited to see us. Emily had a great time loving on Jack and Maddie and got some lessons in planting from Amy in their beautiful back yard. Lane cooked us an excellent lunch of ribs and corn, which Emily chowed down on. Judging from the bones on the table after supper, Lane and Donald appeared to have consumed the greater portion of Hogzilla. We had a great Memorial Day hanging out with our sweet girl and good friends and eating good food. Who could ask for anything more?She loves scooping up the pea gravel and relocating it.
Hanging out with Jack
Looking cute in her little rocker
Planting with Amy
I love this picture of Maddie chilling out. She didn't like having her picture taken - she showed me her behind after I took it!

A Visit with Ethan Hartzog

Donald, Emily, and I had the chance to visit our very dear friends the Hartzogs for Memorial weekend. They live in Loganville in a beautiful home that they've built all by themselves. I was amazed the entire day that they could accomplish such a feat! I still have plants sitting on my front doorstep that need to be potted and I bought them three days ago! Emily and Ethan are only a few months apart in age and had a great time playing together all afternoon while the rest of us caught up and ate a really delicious lunch and some incredible pound cake. We are looking forward to their next visit to see us. It's always fun seeing Emily play with someone her own age. I like to listen in on their conversations to see what they're chattering about! Hanging out with a good book on the porch
Time for some coloring
Sweet hugs

Adam's Graduation Party

My little cousin Adam graduated from Northgate this weekend. I say "little" but I guess he's getting pretty big - he's headed off to college in the fall! I babysat him one whole summer when he was just a litle guy who pretended to be Garth Brooks all the time. We lived on macaroni and cheese and hot dogs for the entire summer because he wouldn't eat anything else. We celebrated his graduation with a party at Larry's house. Emily was really taken with Adam. She played catch with him all night, in between rides on the Gator with Abby. Happy Graduation! Serious talking with Coach White
Posing with the antique gas pump
Don't worry - they didn't have the keys!
Adam and his ladies
Hanging out on the steps

A Post for Uncle David

Emily's Uncle David works for University of Oklahoma and sends us fun Sooners presents in the mail. Emily sleeps each night with a big pillow shaped like a covered wagon and recently sported this T-shirt for a photo shoot with me. I even got her to give the thumbs up in one of them - she's been practicing this with Papa. These pictures are especially for David - or "my good friend David," as she calls him.

Mother's Day

Mother's Day was wonderful for us this year. It has been a blessing to be Emily's mother for another year. She and Donald treated me to a visit to the Veranda Day Spa for my mother's day gift - it's always my favorite! They also let me sleep late while they cooked up a fantastic breakfast for me. We had a busy weekend - we met Donald's family for lunch one day and my family the next. I got some great pictures of Emily eating lunch at O'Charley's and wanted to share them. We met up with the Whites and the Battles in Fayetteville at O'Charley's for Mother's Day lunch and ended up eating next to Evander Holyfield. I didn't take any pictures of him but these of Emily are really cute. Hope your Mother's Day was great!Cheese!
Her favorite meal -bread and pasta, or "clean noonies," as she calls them.
Flossing her teeth?
Playing around with Daddy
CiCi always brings a prize!

Yard Sale 2008

Each year during Palmetto's May Day Festival my family meets up at Mom and Dad's house and we hold a massive yard sale together. None of us have the energy to hold a sale on our own and it's so much more fun to do it together that this has become a yearly event. We're not sure how many years we've been running, but it must be something like 15 or so. At any rate, me and Donald, Mom and Dad, my Aunt Rita, my mom's best friend Shelia and her husband Steve, my cousin Angie, and various other drop-ins convened in Palmetto for the yearly event this Saturday. We had a great time people watching and catching up; we also unloaded lots of stuff that we didn't need anymore. Emily and Abby alternated between playing inside with Amy, jumping on the trampoline, and "shopping"...basically collecting their own things back that we had been trying to sell. Emily actually has a page in her scrapbook of her first yard sale and I didn't want this year to be any different. Here are some pictures of the big day. Drop by and visit us next year! Advertisement
Look at all these great toys! Who would get rid of this stuff?
How much money did you say you had?
Emily and Abby tell everyone they're sisters. They're snuggled up like good sisters here.
Time for lunch, Minnie Pearl!
Abby is always very stylish. I actually used to wear this velvet hat. What was I thinking?

Corn Fed Country Girl

Summertime has certainly arrived because corn on the cob has been appearing on our dinner table a lot lately. Emily loves it! It is hilarious to see her chowing down on an ear of corn. She is very efficient and generally doesn't leave much behind. Aunt Amy caught these cute pictures of her pigging out at the Farr White tonight and we blogged them once Donald and I got home from school tonight. Hope you are all enjoying some good summer food during these warm days! Yum!
Maybe this angle will be better....
I love how thoughtful she looks in this one. She's thinking hard.

A BIG big girl bed!

Emily has been having some trouble sleeping through the night lately, which really stresses Mommy and Daddy. She's always been such a good sleeper (and Mommy and Daddy have started to need lots of sleep in their advanced age) that when she doesn't sleep soundly through the night, we are really out of sorts. We've decided that it's because she's getting too big for her toddler bed. Although she technically still fits, she's always got an arm or a leg hanging off the side when we go in to check on her, which seems pretty uncomfortable. So, Papa decided to create a one-of-a-kind masterpiece; he designed and built her a real big girl bed. He's already made a day bed for Abby and Emily needed a matching one, although hers is the queen-size model. He's been working for months to get it just right and we finally set it up last night. She asked specifically for purple sheets, which we managed to find, and we covered the bed with a beautiful chenille bedspread that belonged to Donald's Grandmother White. Very vintage, which I love! Add in a whole menagerie of stuffed animals and she was ready for a sleepover. She was so excited to see her new big girl bed and we got some very cute pictures to share with you. She at first thought that the sleep fairy brought it but then we reminded her about Papa working on it for so long. Don't laugh about the sleep fairy - those of you with a sleepless toddler should give it a try! Wishing you long sleep-filled nights from the White House!

So much room!

She's been practicing giving the thumbs-up sign.

Posing with Papa

I love this one - her hair looks so red and you can see every little curl!

Fabulastic

I got this shot of Emily tonight at Mmi and Papa's house while she and Abby were reading books together. I love it - her shades are an exact copy of mine, just in pink. And she's wearing them upside down! I think this picture is the definition of fabulosity!

My Sweet Girls

Emily and I were visiting with Mimi and Papa this evening and I managed to snap this sweet picture of them watching TV together. Mimi and I were upstairs looking at everyone's blogs and when we came downstairs to check on the girls (they had been quiet for a while, which is generally a dangerous situation) we found them cuddled up together under a blanket. So sweet!

Chuck E. Cheese!

In a fit of temporary insanity, Amy and I took the girls to Chuck E. Cheese today. We've discovered the secret to a successful visit - bring lots of coupons and get there before 3:00. Hardly anyone was there and the girls could run around and play without lots of confusion, plus we didn't end up spending a fortune. They had a great time shooting hoops, riding roller coasters, and playing ski ball. Abby was the big ticket winner of the day and came home with a great lunchbox and hot pink hair extension. Mim's going to love that when she gets back from her trip! Emily won a new ball and a sucker, which she considered the greatest prize she's gotten in a while. It will be a shame when she stops being satisfied with simple things like suckers! All in all, we had a great time and got lots of great pictures. I couldn't pick, so I decided to post them all. See you soon!

Random Pics

We've taken a bunch of cute pictures lately that I wanted to post and share. They don't necessarily have a theme but I just thought they were too fun not to put out for you all to see. Emily and I are at home together today and I'm taking a second to blog while she tears apart the toy basket (which I just put back together, by the way!). Hope you enjoy this peek into The White House!Having some strawberry shortcake with the Andersons over Spring Break. Notice the pink makeup on her cheek? She and Rachel played beauty shop all evening!
"Helping" Mimi by ironing blankets with the new iron Papa made her to go with her washing machine. Who knew that toy irons were so hard to find? We looked all over with no results so Papa finally made us one.
Chilling out at her new favorite place, the Kiddie Castle Park.
She's learned to dangle, which scares me to death!
I'm so glad that Emily loves to read! We've been reading The Kissing Hand for a few days. She loves to hear about Chester the raccoon going to school and giving kisses to his raccoon Mommy.

Hat Hair

Emily had fun this afternoon playing around with a cowboy hat that I wore to work yesterday. I am part of the Relay for Life team and we've been doing fundraisers all year long; this week is a dress-up week and yesterday was hat day. You all know I love a hat and apparently my daughter is cut from the same cloth. She wore this hat around all afternoon and then insisted on wearing it over to Mimi and Papa's house to deliver their anniversary gift. These pictures were too cute not to share, especially the last one. It shows the bad hat hair that curly-headed girls can get after wearing a hat for too long! And by the way, those are five of my elastic headbands that she's wearing around her neck like necklaces. Again, she wore them all afternoon and it was really difficult to convince her that sleeping in them was not a good idea. Two-year-olds!