Will and Jake at the Dinosaur Exhibit

Emma and Mimi in the herb garden

Will between the butterfly bushes

Me, Marci (aka Martha Ann) and the Kids

Emma and Mia at Will's game

Will "sleeping" on the monkey bars!

Emma taking her morning nap after Mimi and Pop Pop walked with her

Emma after her bath at Mimi and Pop Pops

The Hawkins Grandkids

On Mem. Day, we went to an outdoor Dinosaur exhibit

Emma loves to sit up! She is very close to crawling!

The playground where we went camping

Aunt Marci playing Slap Jack at the camp site

Jake playing at the playground!

We are in a good routine now. I am so happy to have our new home! The boys and Emma are adjusting very well. Every now and then, Jake will say he wants to go play with Miranda (our old neighbor) and I will have to remind him that we moved and Miranda will have to come visit us to play. Poor kid, so much change for such a little mind!
We had a great Memorial Day. We packed up on Friday and headed to the mountains in Alabama to go camping! Yes, Alabama has some beautiful state parks. The one we went to this weekend just happened to be 10 minutes from Matt's parents house in Huntsville. Matt's parents have a camper and we stayed there all weekend. Matt's parents were there as well as Joel and Martha Ann (Matt's bro and his wife). We had a blast. The boys roasted marshmellows and hot dogs. We brought their bikes and so they rode alot. On Saturday, we went to a wonderful park where the boys played and we hiked some there too. It was a beautiful weekend. The weather was perfect. The temps were in the 80's but up in the mountains were more like high 60's low 70's. On Saturday night we cooked chicken fajitas on the open fire with some of Keith and Sherry's camping gadgets. They are camping gurus so they have all this cool camping equipment. Sherry even made homemade peach cobbler over the fire in a dutch oven. One morning for breakfast she made a wonderful breakfast casserole. Just like home!
The boys had a wonderful time and made lots of great memories. That's what it is all about!
Will had a ball tournament tonight. He is really getting the hang of the game. He is making all kinds of friends and just having lots of fun. Paige and Mia came to see him tonight. Mia and Emma had fun hanging out on the blanket. Jake played the entire time with two little friends he has made during the season. Nothing like a cool spring night watching a baseball game. I love it!
Well, I better go. It is time for the nightly ritual Matt and I have....grape juice. Call us crazy, but we drink it every night and watch our favorite shows!
See ya!

This is the morning time crew!

Emma learns to sit up!

Cousin Mia and Emma on their first of many playdates!

Will is on deck "warming up"

Crack kills Emma!

Matt takes the boys to the Home Depot the first Sat. in the month to do a Kids Tool Time!
The boys love it! I think Matt likes it more than they do!

We are finally in our new house! Yippee!! We closed on March 26. We didn't have any furniture or anything out of storage so we slept on our floors! It was fun and something the kids will always remember! Thanks to our families who really helped us get all of our stuff out of storage and put away. We all worked like dogs that weekend!
Since then, I have tried hard to get the kids back into a normal routine. Living with the Grandparents put the scheduling and all the rules on the back-burning for a while. Now, I am ready to inforce rules and stick to my good ol' schedule!
We painted our family room, kitchen and breakfast room this weekend. I wanted a yellow/beige color and it looks great. Amazing what a little paint will do to a room!
Paige and I are going to playdates on Tuesdays. It is a group of girls from church who all have babies the same age as Emma (6-8mo. old). It is a great way to talk to adults and have a good conversation with someone! It also allows me to spend good, quality time with Emma. It seems with the hustle and bustle of these past 8 months, I have let time get the best of me and have forgotten to savor these precious moments. Because I know all too well how fast these young years go! Will is going to kindergarden this year for crying out loud!
Speaking of kindergarden, I took Will to his "new Kindergarden" just up the road from us. I met with the school secretary and she took us on a great tour. It is a brand new school. This is the first year they opened. It's beautiful and so full of bright colors! Will is very excited! He talks about it all the time.
Well, I better go. I need to wind down for the night. Busy weekend we had. Hope all is well with everyone reading this. I will do better posting my blog!

Well, they have begun construction on our new home in Nolensville. They have scheduled the framers on Jan 17. Hopefully this will go up quickly. I cannot wait to get into our new home! Living with the parents makes me really appreciate my own space. Things are actually going fine here, but it just seems like we've been here forever and it's only been since early November.
I took the boys (and Emma!) to the local Community Center today so that Will could practice basketball. He has his first game tomorrow. We signed him up for the church league called Upwards Basketball. We are very excited. He has never played and apparently the little boys he's playing with never have either. It should be very interesting!
After his game at 9am tomorrow, we are heading to Nolensville to spend the night with Paige and Lance. Matt and I wanted to take the boys and Emma to the Spaghetti Factory in downtown Nashville, so we will go there tomorrow night. The boys are so excited. We told them that maybe we could sit in the Caboose! Matt and I haven't been there since college. We used to go there alot b/c I loved the spaghetti! It will be really neat to take our kids there. We plan on going to our church on Sunday and then going to lunch at Chuck E. Cheese's and meeting our old neighboors, Rebecca and Jennifer and their kids Miranda and Madeline there. When we lived in Franklin Green (our old neighborhood) we would play every afternoon with Miranda and Madeline. Our kids were like brother and sisters! It was so sad when we left. I have made a promise with Rebecca that we will always stay in contact.
Emma has started rolling over! It is so cute! I can remember the boys doing the exact same thing. My, how time flies! I am trying to cherish every minute with her b/c I know this will be our last baby. It is sad, but I know it is time to call it quits. I think Matt and I could have 10 more kids b/c we love them so much, but my body can't take pregnancy again! I think this pregnancy really did me in. I was so sick and then my thyroid giving me problem.
Oh, can you please be praying for me b/c I have found a little bump on my thyroid. I hope it is nothing, but you never know. I am going on Jan 24 to the Thyroid Dr. I believe my thyroid is just out of whack and it is trying to make too much hormone so it could get bigger on one side. Hopefully and prayerfully it is nothing to worry about. I will keep everyone posted.

Well, I better go! Got to get up bright and early to see Will play basketball!!!!

Steph