Paxton turns 1.

Lauren, Paxton, & Drew


Birthday boy Paxton enjoying his Yo Gabba cake

Linley took our photo:)

Giggles all around!!


This past week we made our last trip down to Fort Scott to celebrate my nephew Paxton's 1st birthday...Yo Gabba Gabba style!! We went a tad early to enjoy some down time with family before our lives become consumed with school and extracurricular activities. Plus most of my extended family had yet to meet Kessly, so we thought this was a perfect time to introduce her. The weather was gorgeous which meant the kids were able to play outside at my parents without needing full parental monitoring as well as some relaxing porch swinging:)

Also while we were back I was able to enjoy a night out for drinks with 2 of my sisters and cousin April. Even though it wasn't very long it was very much needed and nice to not be interrupted every 5 minutes by "Mom...mom". I look forward to our next chance at getting together for another round!!

Unfortunately that is likely to be our last trip back to my hometown until Thanksgiving...which is much too far off. We do have one more 1st birthday to celebrate next month for Miss Londyn; let the countdown begin.

Growing families.

I'm a bit behind in blogging due to little sleep, constant diaper changing, bottle feedings, and entertaining our 2 older children. The addition of one more to our brood is finally catching up with me and left little time to surf the net, keep up with our blog, snap endless photos...etc. With school less than 2 weeks away I have been trying to enjoy every minute of being home and soaking in all the family time I can before life becomes crazy busy again. My constant mantra this year is "9 more months"...that is til I graduate and move into a new phase; career!!

Linley's summer camp comes to an end today and both Kip and I know she's going to miss it regardless of her brave face. She has made the memories that both of us had hoped she would...she wants to do something different next summer; more than likely it will be sports related! Thayer has been a tremendous help and has been able to some fun things on his own while Linley's been at camp. He's starting to come out of his shy stage and into a more independent personality, which I hope helps him this fall when he starts attending a new preschool.

I do believe now even though we weren't planning to expand our family that 5 of us is much more manageable than either of us anticipated. Now if we could just make it 1 more year in our tiny house without driving one another batty or fighting for the 1 bathroom:)

On a side note: in the span of 6 years my parents have been given 6 grandchildren, more than doubling in size over the last year. Kessly's birth brought all of my sisters to Manhattan which of course had to include a photo-op of all us and our babies!! We are going to have some fantastic birthdays and holidays...not that they weren't already, just more entertaining:)