lj's first fashion show

lj seems to be entering the 'dress myself' phase of life. it's about to get interesting folks.

while i still have to dress her, she proceeded to pick out one article of clothing after the other today, bringing them to me one at a time to put on her. and after each article of clothing was put on, she immediately said, "dada. dada." and would walk out into the loft and show seth her latest outfit.

so cute.

just to clarify, she has on a onsie, then the purple/brown shirt, followed by the green/white tank. then some shorts, followed by 2 pair of bloomers. finished it off with 2 pair of socks on each foot and a rockin' hat from whitney. she wanted to put some pants on as well but i had to go make dinner...so this was the final outfit. rock it girl.

happy {30th} birthday my love

so this year seth didn't get exactly what he wanted for his 30th birthday...a trip to wilkerson obgyn to find out the sex of our child. he's been spoiled the last 2 birthdays. don't even have a positive pregnancy test. sorry babe.

but he did get a nice dinner out with friends and lilly jo on sunday and a baseball game with the family and some friends tonight!
and a nephew yesterday. and a hurricane tomorrow.
so, lots of fun, just not exactly what he wanted:)

seth, i'm so thankful for you in my life. in our children's lives. you are a gracious, loving, humble, handsome man. you take care of your family in ways i never imagined. you take joy in serving in the roles God has given you. you take delight in your children. we are so thankful for you and we love you!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LOU!

matthew.joel.morreale.

Praise God, Matthew Joel Morreale arrived yesterday at 2:37pm. He was 8lb 2oz, 20.5 in long and has a large head measuring in at 38 cm! He is such a handsome fella and John and Nat just love him to pieces already. Nat is doing well, all things considered, and Matthew is also doing just great.
More to come later, but without futher ado, our new little nephew...

past and present

what to expect when you're expecting...

the unexpected.

my niece milana (who is 2 months younger than lilly jo) was born 3 wks early.
her brother matthew is due day after tomorrow and seems content in his momma's belly.

dear matthew,
we're grew impatient 2.5 weeks ago when you weren't born.
please come soon.

xoxo,
aunt becky

ear piercing

how do you tell your 19 month old to not scream at the table when your 7 month old LOVES to scream? i'm not just talking loud noises.

we've got EAR PIERCING SCREAMING MATCHES becoming commonplace at both lunch and dinner.

whew.

too loud for mommy and daddy's ears.

small gesture, big meaning

friday night we met my sister, her hubby, their daughter and my mom for some pizza in cary before heading to the pool...
seth needed to get some cash for dinner so he ran next door to walmart...and apparently got lost in the way. or so i thought. took the man like 15 min to get cash. no joke. and 15 min is a long time when you're in a pizza joint w/ 2 wonderful yet small children, waiting to eat/feed them. patience started to ware, but thankfully he finally decided to join us.
with a card and small gift for me. awwwwwwww:)
it had been a rough couple of days for me as a mom, and in the grand scheme of things i know there are larger issues we'll face, but in the moment, those days were certainly a challenge.
that being said, seth got some cash and THEN proceeded to get me the sweetest card i think he's ever gotten me, along with a cd of my favorite singer from last season's american idol. don't judge.
but the card, simply stated, said this, "we don't do easy. we do interesting. we do challenging. we do hanging in. we do real life. and the inside said, "i'm glad we do." with a few more comments of his own...
almost started to cry in dominic's pizza.

i'm so thankful for the man God chose to give me to share in the joys and harships of this life here on earth...love you lou:)

you know it's time to do laundry when...

you're almost 19 month old daughter is wearing your tshirt to bed...

(i will say this shirt is a kid's XL, which is why she's not completely swallowed by it)

and we're up!

sitting, that is:)
these pics were taken 2 days ago and he's now a pro and we don't really use the boppy behind him anymore.
i can tell he loves the autonomy...i can't imagine how much he's going to love crawling and eventually walking!

cousin aubree lyn comes to visit!

a couple of weekends ago we had the pleasure of having seth's mom, his brother robert and robert's daughter to come visit us for the day! we've not seen miss aubree since cousin dylan's birthday party earlier this spring, so it was lots of fun to play together again! the pictures are pretty much backwards in chronological order, but you get the gist. we started out inside, playing with dogs and toys, and having naptime and lunch. then later in the afternoon we enjoyed some time outside in the sprinkler (well lilly jo enjoyed the sprinkler, but aubree lyn not-so-much) and then racing our walkers. i love these girl's expressions as they're trucking it down the sidewalk...you can see the joy in their faces!!

i know it's no easy task taking a toddler out of town for the day, so we are especially grateful they made the journey to come see us for a few hours! thanks guys...we loved it!

screams of joy

all done?

lilly jo's amazing (and disgusting) new talent

so this was completely blog-worthy the first time it happened, however time got away and it never got posted. a week later however, it's still happening and i feel a post is in order, ASAP.

recently we've had a problem with flies in our house, so i bought a fly swatter from target. it's nice. cheap. red. standard.
occasionally lilly jo will find a dead fly down by our back door and she'll pick it up and bring it to me and say "dahs, dahs" which means "trash". i'm like, ewww, thank you lilly jo. now let's go wash your hands.

well the other day she brought me what i thought was a dead fly. only when she handed it to me it promptly flew away. YES. it was not dead. begs the question, "how did she get the fly?"
well i watched that darn fly go over to our back door window and try and get out. and meanwhile lilly jo went right back over to the door and i watched her try and catch that darn fly for 30 seconds. and then she caught it! i could not believe it!!!!! right in front of my own two eyes.

grody to the max. back to the bathroom to wash her hands.

i kid you not she has caught about 5 so far in total.

and today seth was doing the dishes and called me over and said he had something to show me. low and behold he opens his hand and has a live fly in his hands. all he says to me is, "i think it runs in the family...."

hilarious. and nasty. surely this cannot be our family talent.

and i know on a few occasions wilbur has caught a few flies in his mouth as well.

moral of the story =

don't buy a fly swatter from target. just call the apples. we've got ya covered!