A Little of This, A Little of That

This is a major catch-up post!  It is suddenly the middle of May (May 15th to be exact, which is my Mom's birthday, Happy Birthday MiMi!) - April seemed to drag by and May has been super fast.  The weather here is getting much better.  Lots of really pretty days and weekends with some rain but not like the month of April!  The temps have been in the 60's so when Arden gets home from school we play on the driveway for a while.  Her choice of activities lately has been sidewalk chalk.  She will make some scribbles and then hands me the chalk so I can make my own scribbles.  We feed her dinner and put her to bed.  Sometimes she has been in bed before 8:00 and I sort of feel bad because I can still hear birds chirping outside!  But she is so, so tired from school that she is happy to have a bath and be in her biscuit.  Kevin and I have really enjoyed sitting on the back deck and cooking out at night - it is still cool enough though I am wearing a fleece and usually have to go inside after too long because I am cold...such a good problem to have though!

Our weekends have been quiet but packed full of little adventures which is nice.  We are having so much fun living as a family of 3 again :).  Monday's are always hard because we have gotten spoiled by our weekend family time.  Soon (I promise) I will post about the "circus" we went to on Friday night.  It was entertaining to Arden, which is all that matters, but a few times Kevin and I laughed out loud at the performances...let's just say it wasn't The Ringling Brother's or Barnum & Bailey's!

Easter weekend wasn't what we had planned.  Kevin caught a major bug and was laid up for a few days so we celebrated the next weekend.  Luckily, the Easter Bunny was able to come back and give Arden her present and hide a few eggs for her ;).

{This is the play kitchen the Easter Bunny brought Arden - she loves it!}

{This was her excitement when she saw Daddy after she woke up from her nap...what a face!}

{She's has been Daddy's girl lately, it is really sweet}

{Checking out the kitchen}

{Doing some laundry}

{Checking the oven}

{Her face when she saw Easter eggs "hidden" on the deck.  She let out a gasp of excitement!}

{Picking up her eggs, with Izzy's help of course.  She later found out the eggs had Goldfish, puffs and pretzels in them - all of her favorites!  Such a good Easter Bunny!}

{Attempted a photo opp in her dress}

{Izzy joined her on the bench.  Notice she is feeding Izzy a pretzel while holding one pretzel in her mouth and one in each of her hands!}

{Finally a smile...with pretzels of course!}

{Happy girl :)}

Mother's Day was a weekend long celebration.  Kevin really made it special for me and made sure we did whatever I wanted to do.  Of course, the things I wanted to do were sleep-in and hang out with he and Arden.  Friday night we cooked out and relaxed at home.  Saturday we went to lunch at Five Guys (yum burgers!) then did a little shopping and went to the park.  We went to Morristown to eat dinner and walked around downtown some and enjoyed Cold Stone too (always a fan of that!).  Sunday morning Kevin made cinnamon rolls and gave me a gift that Arden made :).  He took her to a local place that paints pottery (just like Different Strokes in Fayetteville) and they made a platter for me that has her hand print on the bottom.  Something so sweet and something I will love using!

{This girl LOVES going down slides!}

{Driving the train}

{Gotta love her crooked smile!!}

{Back to the slide - this time with Dad!}

{Mom got to ride the train with Arden this time!}

Hope you are all enjoying your May - summer is right around the corner...woooo hoooo!

Hugs,
Hillary

Yogurt Bath

Arden has really wanted to be independent lately.  It makes me so happy in so many ways and really tests my patience in others.  One thing she is into right now is feeding herself - and I am not talking about feeding herself Goldfish or grapes, I am talking about yogurt and applesauce!  So, we try and embrace it and encourage her and take her straight to the bath when she is finished ;).

{Not a yogurt pic - even though she is holding her yogurt on her way to her highchair - but one day last week I was out of town so Kevin got her ready for school.  She refused to take off her pajama top so he put her dress over it and off she went...here you can see her orange sleeves sticking out!}

{And it begins...we pretty much undress her for this whole thing!}

{The spoon gets boring so her hands go right in the cup!}

{Pouring the yogurt out is much easier!}

{Using both hands to get every little bit she can...or what hasn't dropped on her belly yet!}

{Back to the spoon but what you can't see is she is now using the wrong end of the spoon - and there is no correcting her!}

{Pointing to the Backyardigans on TV}

{All finished!}

{She isn't a fan of the mess in the end but like I said, and you can now see, we go straight to the bath!}

{Not sure you can tell very well but this is what happens to Izzy when she stands under the highchair waiting for food to drop...she has Cheerios stuck all over her back!!}

Things are good here!  The weather is still yucky most days but we are learning to manage.  I met some more neighbors and they are great!  Two of them have daughters around Arden's age so I am hoping we can have lots of play dates!

We ended up having a very uneventful Easter.  Kevin caught a major bug and was sick all weekend so we hung at home.  We talked to the Easter Bunny and he said he would come back when we could get Arden up and outside to hunt eggs so he will be back and we will definitely have pics ;)!

Hugs,
Hillary

Week 2.5

Week 2.5...feels like month 8!  I don't mean that in a bad way but we have been busy, a good busy.  Work has taken over for me so Kevin is being Mr. Mom (thanks Kev!).  We still have some boxes to unpack - I keep telling everyone they are the boxes we never should have brought but I think I am finally motivated to get them unpacked.  Unpacking/organizing took over our life for the first weekend we were here so I got burned out and had to stop for a while!  Kevin, bless his heart for putting up with me, would have had a home for every single thing by now if it wasn't for me saying "oh, let's do it later!"  I follow that with, "we will get it done" and I know we will...in time ;).  (But to my credit anyone who knows me well is not surprised by those last two sentences!)

What we have been doing...

Getting Arden's ears "rechecked."  As I said earlier, I was not looking forward to finding a new pediatrician (heart Dr. Averitt!), and while we found a good, solid doctor we didn't find "our" doctor.  Arden's ear infection/sinus infection/conjunctivitis (sp?) was gone when we went for the recheck but she did still have fluid on her ear so we are still on meds and have to go back and recheck the recheck at 3 weeks, so we will throw in her 18-month check up at that time with another doctor (same clinic) and then shop around if we need too.  The doctor we saw last week wasn't bad, he was very qualified and warmed-up the more we stood around and talked but he isn't from the South ;).  As my Dad says though, if they are a good doctor we can deal with personality!

Arden has done pretty well.  We are all adjusting and I don't give her enough credit for knowing what is going on.  Bless her heart - a new house, a new school and a mommy traveling for work within 2.5 weeks is a lot on little one.  But she is a trooper and her smile gets us thru! She and I have been fighting about her hair (I am sure the first fight of many!)...it is time for a bow or some sort of barrette to keep the front held back but every time I put something in she pulls it out.  And not only does she pull it out she fusses until it comes out and as soon as she realizes it is out of her hair she smiles and goes on her merry little way ;).  What HAS happened is she has teachers at school fixing her hair and, of course, she LOVES it.  One day she came home with a pony tail and one day hair sticking straight up on her head like Pebbles.  How they get her to sit still so they can fix her hair I have no idea but it is my new goal to be able to get her to wear something in her hair...I mean she wore bows and flowers larger than her head until a few months ago, it will be a piece of cake...right?!

And she learned to climb the stairs and go down on her bottom (video below).  That same night the second baby gate went up so we now have one at the top of the stairs and the bottom of the stairs...no one seems to be more annoyed than Izzy ;).

{Dr.'s appointment...see what I mean about her hair?!  It was rainy that day though ;)!}

{Arden: "Daddy, I am going to do it...I can go up and down all by myself, just watch." }

 

{Has anyone seen Bam Bam?!}

{So I got her to wear this bow for at least half a day...then we are going shopping and I hear "uh oh" and I turn around to find her handing me the bow, very innocently, but it hasn't been in her hair since!)

{Izzy has made herself at home!}

{Arden's first art project!!!  Easter eggs, bunnies and chicks...a masterpiece!}

The weather here has been yucky.  Only about a handful of sunny days.  Someone told me that if I didn't like the weather in Connecticut (this was while I was working) then wait a minute, it would change...I didn't have the heart to tell him that was the joke in Arkansas too!  When it warms up we will be out and about and have lots to talk about!

On another note, technology is a wonderful thing!  Since I was prego with Arden we have had a "gender party" where we do old wives tell type of tests to try and predict if we are having a boy or a girl.  Tonight was Shelly's night and I was there via Skype...between tears and smiles (from me of course!) we found out Shelly is having a....

Hugs,

Hillary

Quiet but Happy.

That was the report we got about Arden on her first day of her new school...and we will take it!  She was great!  Neither of us cried when we left each other (probably more of an accomplishment for me!), she napped like she was supposed to and didn't have any issues all day.

{There were many attempts to get a first day of school picture but all I really came up with was her sticking her tongue out...oh well, still pretty cute!}

{Arden: "Is my lunch in here Mom?"}

{On our way!}

Before I left yesterday I was watching Arden look at the other kids (almost with amazement) and one little girl seemed to be fascinated that there was a new kid in the class.  She was so fascinated that she got really close to Arden, definitely in Arden's personal space, so Arden took a step back and the girl took a step forward. Arden took a step back and the girl stepped forward, this went on for a few steps back and forth before Arden bailed and walked off from her completely.  It made me laugh to myself because even at such a young age you can see what she is comfortable with and what she isn't comfortable with and obviously someone new in her face isn't her thing!

I have a feeling she won't stay quiet for long but warms my heart to know that she was happy...at least for day 1 ;).

Hugs,
Hillary

We Are Here!

We are here!  Here in our New Jersey house :).  When I look back over the past two weeks it seems so hard to believe that we moved out of our Fayetteville house, stayed with family for a week, came to NJ last Thursday and have been here almost a week...no wonder I am exhausted!  But I don't want to sound like I am complaining because for the whirlwind it has been it has been pretty smooth going which I couldn't be more thankful for.  I give credit to my organized husband but a big shout out goes to the movers who packed our stuff (very thoroughly I should add), drove it to NJ and brought it in our house - they were amazing!  We were told that having professional movers was awesome and that they moved everything so you really had to make sure you were prepared for them to come and pack you up.  That is an understatement!  When unpacking Arden's boxes we found a bag of dirty diapers from the Diaper Genie (I kid you not) that we had laying on the floor in her old room that we were going to take to the trash.  I guess they thought we would need them for some reason!  Charles and Luis (I wish I had their pic) took good care of us and we have already told them to be ready to move us out in a few years ;).

The day before we came to NJ we took Arden to my pediatrician in Texarkana because she was fighting what we thought was a cold but wanted to have her checked out before we put her on the plane.  Good thing we went!  She had a right ear infection, sinus infection and clogged tear ducts.  I didn't get any pictures of her at her worst (she will thank me for that one day) but in the pictures below you will see how her eyes were red and puffy, this was after two rounds of an antibiotic and she already looked SO much better.  Finding a pediatrician for her here was one of my main concerns because of how much we LOVED ours in NWA so I was hoping to look around for a pediatrician for a little while but we now have an appointment next week to have her ear rechecked.  We are going to one of the main clinics here and if we are happy we can stick with it otherwise we will get this appointment behind us and keep shopping around.

We are still getting settled.  We made lots of progress the first days we were here but then I burned out.  The last things we have to do are most likely the things we shouldn't have brought but we have never claimed to be neat freaks :).  There are still some boxes to be unpacked and our walls are empty but now we are focused on getting back to work and getting Arden started in school, which starts tomorrow!

We have met one set of our neighbors, they are great!  On Sunday two of their kids, Owen and Julia, came over with brownies, tulips and a hand written note welcoming us to the neighborhood.  They also gave us their phone number in case we had questions.  They were so mature and poised that Kevin and I have already said that we want Arden to grow up just like them!  The next day we walked over to their house to introduce ourselves and we met Carla, the mom, and their other son, Brendan.  He and Julia played with Arden for about 20 minutes all on their own and they didn't even mind that she wanted to take apart their train track!  The kids are older 11, 10 and 6 but they already love Izzy and Arden so we feel like this could be good.  Plus, Carla told us that they tailgate at little league baseball games...they sound like they are right up our alley!

I have had several requests for pics of the house but I haven't felt ready to take those and share them yet so for now I have pics of our trip here...

{This was Arden the morning we woke her up to fly to NJ...think she slept hard that night?!}

{At the LR airport...I guess Arden felt sorry for Izzy since she was in the crate so Arden tried to feed Izzy her vanilla wafer through the mesh!}

{To pass the time Arden tore up a roll of toilet paper and handed pieces to all of us, so thoughtful!}

{More toilet paper}

{Arden on plane ride #2...she was tired of sitting in our laps by then so she stood between us and luckily the flight attendants didn't mind!  Her poor eyes :( }

{Arden watching Backyardigans on the ipod and stuffing pretzels in her mouth}

{She LOVED the hotel bed!}

{Arden brushing Kevin's hair - if he tried to raise his head she would push it back down so she could keep brushing!}

{Arden has really been into helping lately which doesn't always turn out to be helpful but here she actually put her pj's in her drawer!  I was thrilled!}

{Part of our junk drawer from home!  I was unpacking kitchen boxes and found this wrapped in paper...told you they packed everything!}

{Fort Knox!  We decided to get out of the house on Saturday and when we came home we realized all the doors were locked and no one had a key, oops!  Luckily the window was open in Mom's room and Kevin had a ladder that could reach the roof so he had to climb in the window to get in the house...we have the keys on our key chains now :).  Thanks Mom for holding the ladder!}

We already miss everyone so much but we are so excited about this new adventure.  A big shout out to my Mom who came and stayed with us for almost a week.  Without her we would not have made two flights with a dog and baby and been able to unpack and start to get settled while Arden wanted to play.  Thank you thank you thank you for your time and patience, we love you!

Stay tuned for pics of the house!

Hugs,

Hillary

Random Recap

I titled this random recap because it is something I wanted to make sure I captured but really it is just one thing that has been going on since my last post.  There will be a few of these coming up but I thought this was a good starting point.

Since my last post we found a house in NJ.  We also found a school for Arden, which was a huge weight off of my shoulders.  We left feeling productive and with a good feeling about making a transition to a new place.  We went home to our last normal week in NWA, as much of a normal week that we could have.  Throughout that week I gathered things around the house that were not going to be moved so we could sell them in our garage sale.  Really, they could be classified as things that we shouldn't have even owned but they were the things that SOLD.  It was a very successful garage sale - we closed the door two hours after opening!  Doug and MB contributed some stuff to sell so we had lots to choose from!  We think we had a hoarder come and shop, in fact she was the best customer of the day, so that was entertaining :).  Once that was wrapped up we went to dinner with the gang to start our week long celebration of life in NWA.  Sunday was small group as usual but it was different because it was our last one with the group we have grown so close to and so comfortable with.  The group is one of a kind and as I said at our last dinner together, they are an amazing group that we could not be more thankful for!  On Tuesday the movers came and from there on it is a blur but slowly but surely we watched our furniture, clothes, toys and "stuff" be packed into boxes and loaded on the 18-wheeler that is taking it to our new house.  We lived in and around boxes until we couldn't take it anymore and at that point moved into my brother's (shout out to Doug for letting us take over his house).  More on the packing of the house later!

As I mentioned earlier we had a week long celebration of life in NWA.  We are so blessed and thankful for all of our friends and as my Facebook post says, each and every one of you have become family.  Tuesday night we went to dinner at Primo's.  I know I have mentioned it before but our group has grown so much with all of the kiddos we have now!  It is so much fun!  Arden L.O.V.E.S. her friends (she wishes they were all mobile like her!)...

{Such a happy girl that her friends were with us!}

{Alicia and I with our girls}

{Arden has a major crush on Asher...here she is trying to get his attention, typical boy was playing hard to get :)!}

{Look Mom, he sees me!}

{Arden: Hey Ellison!  We have LOTS to talk about!  Ellison: Why have you been trying to hug my head?!}

{These two are my favs as they really captured the end of the night and Arden's love for her girls.  Carter put Ellison in her car seat while Arden was watching his every move and as soon as he picked up the car seat she wrapped her little arm around the handle and walked with him the entire way to their truck.  She would have gotten in with them if we would have let her!  It was SUPER cute and she was so proud of herself...she is going to be a great friend!!}

It was a great, relaxing night (although Arden was VERY busy at the restaurant) that reminded me of what we would miss most about Fayetteville...our friends...our family.  I love those spur of the moment group dinners and the nights we all have babysitters and can go have adult nights :).  Alicia did try and make me feel better though by saying they wouldn't be doing that while we were gone...at least not for six months ;).  I appreciate the thought but enjoy each other for us just save a place for us because we will be back!

Hugs,

Kevin, Hillary and Arden

Wow, where has February gone?

I know February is a short month but really, where did it go?!  We started the month with our usual conversation, H: "Do you think the company is going to make us move soon?", K: "I don't know, I am not going to say anything until they do!", H: "Ok, good with me, I like that plan!".  Since May of 2010 that has been our almost weekly conversation.  Our questions were answered in mid-February.  We talked to the company and the company said, "come on up!" so we managed to get an offer on our house (we had to price aggressively, sorry neighbors, the comps are now WAY down) and with some negotiation we accepted and here we are in NJ looking for a new house.  Notice I say house and not a home.  Kevin uses the term "home" to talk about a house.  Most of you know what I mean.  To me, a house is a structure - it is all about the brick and mortar and the cosmetics and appearance.  A home, is "where the heart is," where your family is (cheesy but something we have learned on this journey).  And even tough we are leaving our family to survive on their own in Arkansas (I think they will do just fine for themselves!) we are picking up and moving our family of three to a new "house."  A house in the Northeast part of the country, a place we know very little about (this is my second time here) but a place we are very excited about.  Just a train ride from NYC, we have big plans to visit there often and give Arden experiences a lot of people only wish they had.  Our family of three is going to make a new "home," and we couldn't be more excited (and scared) of the new life we are going to experience together.  Lots of quality time will be had by the three of us and for Kevin and I we couldn't think of anything better.  I will keep you updated on our house hunting, day one helped us get down to a short list but tomorrow will be the big decision day after seeing a few more properties.  Wish us luck!

In current news around the Shipp "house," Arden got a hair cut!  Wow.  I drug my heels on this one.  I WAS. NOT. going to get her hair cut at this young of an age but when push came to shove it had to be done.  After Doug and Mary Beth got engaged I said I would get her hair cut "before the wedding," but the more I thought about it a little trim now and maybe one more before the wedding wasn't a bad idea.  I know a lot of moms would be excited for their daughters to have enough hair to cut at 16.5 months but it just broke my heart.  I didn't cry though!  I really prepared myself with the idea and called Aunt Mary Beth to ask her if she could do it before I could back out.  It wasn't an overall cut just a little cleaning up on the back of her neck.  But when I called Mary Beth to ask her sweet Mary Beth said "Are you sure?  Have you really been thinking about this?" - I love some MB!  It needed to be done, the mullet stage was pretty much gone but the out-of-control stage was becoming an everyday thing and even wetting it and combing it was almost a lost cause.  So MB made a house call and was awesome with Arden who overall wasn't interested in what was happening with her hair but was not wanting to be bothered while watching Backyardigans (yes, she was watching Backyardigans AGAIN... Nickelodeon, please call me if you need a spokesperson, Arden is IN!).  I don't have a really good before picture but this is the after picture...who would not LOVE this bob with side bangs and natural flip in the back ;)?!

{arden gave a profile view so you could check out her curl!  really she was just watching Backyardigans and was not interested in the camera!  but really, how cute is the haircut?!}

{arden and mb after the major bonding moment of the haircut!  arden doesn't know how lucky she is to have her mb!}

{post-haircut arden was very chill...i mean it is such a hard life to have your stylist come to your house and update your 'do while you watch your favorite show and eat snacks!}

Other than that we spent February trying to survive the snow (I have to throw out there that here in NJ I have only seen a few piles of snow which gives me hope that it doesn't last forever here, although I am fully aware there will probably be one more snow before spring is really here!).  

My little brother (I should say younger since I am shorter than he is!) got engaged on Valentine's Day!  He didn't want to be the cliche couple that got engaged on Valentine's Day but after a little trouble finding the ring in the mail he decided it was time!  I am so proud of him and CAN'T. WAIT. until the big day (August 13th!).  He and MB are so lucky to have each other and she has been part of the family for a long time but now it is going to be official ;).  They are both so lucky to have each other and we know they will have many, many years of happiness together.

A few random pics we have:

{not sure why we took this pic but i have a feeling i was trying to entertain arden and she LOVES seeing her face on the iphone so we snapped a quick pic!}

{when arden was younger and she saw the phone in her face she would smile as if she knew she was a model on a photoshoot....well, she is still the model but the photoshoot has come down to us begging for a smile and for her to look at the camera.  i guess this is a candid pic of her dressed before church in this precious purple dress while watching, you guessed it backyardigans!}

Hugs,

Kevin, Hillary and Arden