Happy Birthday Meme!

Happy Birthday Meme - 90 years young today!

We had such a great time celebrating my grandmother's birthday this past Sunday. She knew there was a party planned for her after church, but she had no idea the whole family and a lot of friends had been invited to join her at church that morning. She was overjoyed when so much of her family and Pop's family from Newnan came in on Sunday morning. Even Aunt Nell was able to come; at 90 herself, she is Pop's youngest (of 13!) and last surviving sibling, and Meme was thrilled to see her. Of course, she loved seeing all her great-grandchildren too! We all enjoyed a wonderful worship service together, and then we headed to the fellowship hall and patio to enjoy a BBQ lunch and let Meme visit with everyone who came to honor her. Here are just a few of the many pictures taken.

Ryan snapped a picture of the patio before anyone got out there. We were all so thankful for a beautiful day.

One of Meme's delicious cakes. This one was a strawberry cake while the other one was vanilla.
The birthday girl enjoys having Happy Birthday sung to her.

Everyone gathers to sing. We think there were about 200 people altogether.

Meme's three boys have a special way of serenading her!

Meme always had African Violets on her windowsill at her house that she and Pop lived in since the mid-60's before she moved to Smyrna Towers a few years ago. All her grandchildren (that's my generation) remember seeing these every time we would visit their house. Jodi had the great idea of having all the great-grandkids decorate clay pots and putting African Violets in to use as table decorations. Here are three of the pots in front of a beautiful picture of Meme. See if you can guess which two Lily and Mia made.

This the bouquet of 90 long-stem roses that our family friend, Doug Bowles, sent for the occasion. This picture doesn't do them justice; they were truly stunning.

More beautiful decorations; I love this picture of Meme when she was in her early 20's!

Meme with her three sons and their families.

Meme with Lily and Mia. My girls absolutely adore Meme. She lives pretty close to us, and just about every time we drive past the apartment tower, they will start pointing and saying "Meme's house! Meme's house!" They love every visit with her; I'm sure it has nothing to do with the snacks she gives them each time!

I love Meme!

Meme with her 11 great-grandchildren; they range in age from 2 to 13.

Meme with her younger brother, Roy. Her two older sisters, Margie and Doris, have passed away.

Meme with her boys; my dad is on the top left, Joe is on the top right and Randy is sitting next to Meme. She and Pop raised three great men!

Meme with her five grandchildren.

What a wonderful day celebrating an amazing woman!

I have so many wonderful memories of Meme. I'm sure most of you know a lot of them revolve around food. I used to spend the night at Meme and Pop's house a lot when I was a kid. One thing I loved was that just a little before bedtime, Meme would give me a snack of either Nilla Wafers and peanut butter or Graham Crackers dipped in milk. Both of my girls call Graham Crackers "Meme crackers" because she still has them in her apartment and shares them each time we visit. Growing up, Meme used to cook for the whole family (that would be her sons and their families) every Thursday night. I have eaten at a lot of good restaurants, but nothing compares to eating at Meme's! In the last week, I have made both of the the first two things Meme taught me how to cook: grilled cheese sandwiches one night and scrambled eggs another; simple, but delicious! Her meals were a lot more involved though: fried chicken, country ham, country fried steak, chicken salad, mashed potatoes, gravy, biscuits, cornbread, fried okra, corn, green beans, lima beans, jello salads...my mouth is watering just thinking about it. Thank you for always feeding us a delicious meal.

Meme has always shown me the importance of a true relationship with the Lord. I vividly remember going to her house and seeing 5 Bibles, each a different translation, sitting on the ottoman of her chair, so she could read and study to deepen her faith. I remember being in her living room as she taught me my first Bible verse (John 3:16). She often gave her grandkids Bibles at important times in our lives. In the front of each one, she would sign her name and write a verse that she wanted us to think about and keep in our hearts. In one that she gave me, she inscribed Proverbs 3:5-6; I have grown to cherish this verse, and I thank Meme for leading me to it. Meme has a Christlike servant's heart that I have never seen in anyone else. She faithfully taught Sunday School for over 50 years; I am so proud that she was my Sunday School teacher for 3rd, 4th and 5th grades. I can't begin to count the number of people's lives she has touched over the years, and the impact she has made for God's Kingdom. Thank you Meme for such a great example of how to be a Godly woman, wife and mother. You are truly an inspiration.

Love This

I love seeing the girls like this!

Sweet Mia

Mia really seems to be enjoying her new big girl bed. She is happy to get in each night; let's see how long that lasts!

As I put her down last night, I said "Good night Angel. I love you." She replied "Good night Angel. I love you so much." I wanted to scoop her back up; this little one is so precious!

Lily fell down a little while ago which produced a minor scratch on her arm. She was crying, so Mia immediately went running into Lily's room saying "Phoebe! Phoebe!" That's the name of Lily's stuffed cat that she sleeps with each night. She grabbed Phoebe from Lily's bed, brought it back in to her and said "Here you go Lily. Phoebe help it better." She knows that Glo makes her feel better when she's upset, so she wanted to help Lily in the same way. What a sweetheart.

A couple of weeks ago, Mia and I were reading Dr. Seuss' "Mr Brown Can Moo, Can You? and Mia said "I read it." She took the book, looked at the cover and said "Mr Brown Can Moo. Can you do that Mommy?" She then proceeded to "read" the book to the best that her memory would allow. I love that she is developing a love of books too!

Three Lily Stories

Three Lily stories for you:

1. Ryan couldn't find his wedding ring yesterday; that is not a good feeling. We looked all around where he normally takes it off plus a few other places that we thought maybe he had taken it off. At one point, we even took apart the drain in our bathroom sink because I thought I heard something drop in it. Finally, I asked Ryan if he had asked the girls for their help; they are fascinated by jewelry, and I thought they might have taken it. As soon as Ryan asked, Lily said "Mia was playing with it yesterday," so we asked Mia if she remembered where she had it. She got up and started walking through the house, moving her arms all in circles and saying "I walked around and around and around with it" and "I can't remember" when asked where she put it. Then Lily jumped in with "I saw her take it into her room," so we went in there and sure enough, it had fallen on the floor near Mia's humidifier. Yea! We thanked the girls for their help and reminded them not to play with our jewelry. I then told Lily, "I'm glad you have such a good memory that could help us find Daddy's ring" to which she replied "Yea, I have a big brain in my head that remembers a lot." There are times I think her brain remembers more than mine!

2. While we were eating dinner last night, out of nowhere Lily leans over to me and says "You are the prettiest Mommy ever." For the record, I was wearing yoga pants and a t-shirt from college (it was laundry night, what can I say?), so I certainly didn't feel very pretty. Lily knows how to make my day!

3. Also at dinner last night, this is what Lily tells us:
"Mommy, I know how to speak French. When I was 3 years old, I went to South French. Do you remember? Atlanta is here (holds up one hand next to her), South French is here (holds her other hand pretty close to that) and Birmingham is over there where my shoes are (points across the table where she can see her shoes)." "Wow, that's pretty cool Lily. What did you do while you were there?" "Well, we watched the horses race. I went with Bama. Do you remember Bama?" Bama thinks about how to respond, so I said "Lily if you were three, how old was Bama when you went?" "She was twenty-four" which makes us all laugh. Liz asks "Did we ride in a car or fly on a plane to get there?" Lily thinks for a second and says "We flew on a plane because it's a lot faster." She pauses and then says "We could take a helicopter!" Can someone please tell me what made my 4 year old think about going to the South of France in a dream???

Girls' Rooms

While the girls were in Birmingham last week, we made a few changes to their rooms. Mia's room saw the most changes as we changed out the nursery into her "big girl" room. We put in a new bed (the bed was mine growing up too!), took down the valence and put up a curtain and added lots of cute decorations. We made it into something of a nature theme, and it looks adorable. Mia was so excited when she saw it! She kept looking around, pointing to everything and going "Oh!" Last night was her first night in the new bed, and though it took awhile for her to get to sleep, she slept very well and stayed in all night. Here are some pictures to show her new room:

This is my favorite part of her room. We put up stickers on her long wall that looks like a tree with animals and flowers around it. We added the little Ikea bench seat to look like a park bench under the tree. It holds her stuffed animals, and she loves it.

This is the owl pillow we found at Target. Love it! Of course, Mia's Glo has to be nearby too!
We also found this picture at Target; isn't it cute?

Both girls love the butterfly finials we put on the curtain hold-backs.

A view of half of Mia's room.

The other half of Mia's room. Doesn't it look great?!

We also made a few touch-ups to Lily's room so she wouldn't feel completely left out after seeing Mia's room. FYI, that didn't stop all the whining of "but she got the lotest!" We're working on learning that sometimes people get things and we don't, but we're always grateful for the MANY things we do have.

We made Lily's room into more of a butterfly theme; she loves butterflies. We put the new butterfly sheets that Liz bought on her bed, and we added cute wall stickers around her picture. It's difficult to see in this picture, but there are a few 3-inch tall 3-D butterflies there too. They have beading on them, and they are really beautiful. Lily loved them.

We put a couple of little flowers near the floor between her bed and door.

I left Lily's coloring of a business woman on her closet door; she was very proud of this piece because she said it was me. I couldn't take it down!

This is the other piece of Lily's coloring that I left up on her closet door. She was very proud of her cat drawing and that she had written our names on it.

I added this garden on the wall near her doll house.

A picture of Lily's wall and closet. You can see her medal from The Little Gym hanging on her closet door too; she was so excited to receive it a few weeks ago.

The other corner of Lily's room. We didn't change anything (other than cleaning up the books and games), but I wanted a picture to document what it looks like.

I can't believe I have two big girls now!

A Few More Pieces of Art

Here are a few more pieces of artwork that I came across recently. Lily brought all of these home on the last day of school in an artwork folder.

Her self-portrait.

A Christmas angel made from Lily's hands.
Lily's hands also made a Valentine's heart.

Lily said this next picture was her favorite of the projects in her folder. They painted their hands different colors and made them into Fall leaves.

I love this page called "Spotlighting Me!" In case you can't read what it says, here you go: Name "Lily Hooks" ("s" is written backwards), I am "4" years old (4 is also written backwards), My birthday is "10-4-06" (no idea where she learned it as 10-4-06; whenever I ask what her birthday is, she says October 4th), My hair is "brown," My eyes are "Hazel," I like to eat "cake," and I can "turn flips." So there's Lily in a nutshell!

While the Kids Are Away...

the parents will play! We were thrilled when Liz offered to take Lily and Mia to Birmingham this week. It is VBS week at Shades, and Liz is needed each day to work. So, she takes the girls with her. They get to enjoy VBS and a change of scenery, Ryan and I get a fantastic break and Liz, well, Liz does a lot of work but it is greatly appreciated by us and the people at the church!

Soon after they left on Sunday afternoon, Ryan and I headed to Buckhead. First, we did a little shopping at Lenox because we are making Mia's room into her official "big girl" room this week while she is gone, and we needed a few things for it. After picking up a few things at Pottery Barn Kids, we headed to the Grand Hyatt on Peachtree. Ryan had scored an excellent deal for us on Facebook for a discounted night here. After a little bit of relaxing we decided to head to Pricci for dinner. The Buckhead Life Group is doing their summer promotions at their restaurants again this year, and we had a nice gift card to Pricci; we decided to take advantage and enjoyed a lovely dinner. After dinner, we headed back to the Hyatt where we relaxed and watched a movie ("Limitless;" it was interesting, but nothing great). It was awesome to take a Sleep Aid pill at 11:30 at night knowing we wouldn't be woken up early by a little one!

On Monday, we woke up at 10:50 which was just enough time to order room service breakfast for Ryan and brunch for me! We both couldn't believe how great we felt after such a good night's sleep. After brunch, we took our time getting ready and then headed to check-out. Because there was a slight mix-up in the deal we had purchased, the very generous general manager comped our parking and movie and then gave us 25% off the room service bill. In addition to that, he gave us 12,000 points to our brand new Hyatt account which he says is enough for a free night at any US Hyatt. Thank you very much Hyatt; we will be happy to stay with you again!

We spent most of Monday afternoon running errands, and then we headed over to Mom and Dad's house to pick up Mia's new day bed. It used to be my bed growing up, and it was currently residing in their house, but they were kind enough to let us take it back. We moved it over to our home, ate some dinner and then proceeded to start cleaning out Mia's room. We got a lot accomplished, but there's still a ways to go.

On Tuesday, we decided we wanted a pure day of fun, so we headed to White Water. It has been about 18 years since either of us had visited. I was like a giddy little girl on our way over because I just couldn't wait to get there; I used to love White Water growing up, and I knew we would have a lot of fun. It has changed a good bit, but we had an absolute blast! We felt like kids again...for awhile. Then we realized we are not nearly as young as we used to be. Some of those rides knocked us around pretty good! We walked all around (we had forgotten how hot cement feels on bare feet), and climbed what felt like at least 1,000 stairs. Ryan's tailbone took a beating on the Dragon's Tail ride while my eardrum and equilibrium were thrown off on another ride. Even as we hobble around today, it was completely worth it! It's been awhile since I've had this kind of fun, and I can't wait to go back!

We didn't get home until after 6, so we decided to just relax and try to recoup a little bit and get to bed early. We had to return the real world this morning as we both had early meetings. We had productive days and got home about 6 this evening. We have been cleaning for hours. I have been working on the playroom (it is completely overrun with too much stuff and has been driving me crazy for weeks) while Ryan did an amazing job on our laundry room. Tomorrow is our last evening to get everything finished before the girls return on Friday, and it's doubtful that we'll knock everything off our to-do list. Regardless, this has been a fantastic week and our progress of cleaning out has made a huge difference! We are so grateful that Liz was willing to take the girls this week, so we could be productive and also recharge a little bit. Thank you!

Art Projects

The girls love to make art projects. It is so much fun to watch them while they work on them too. Lily will sit still and concentrate really hard on what she is doing; she really takes pride in her projects. Mia has fun with projects too but she scribbles a bit on one page then moves on to the next to scribble a little more. She's only 2.5 though, and she still has fun making things! I am trying to take pictures of their art work (there is a ton of it too since they like to keep every single thing they make!) since I do all digital scrapbooks now. Here are a few pictures of art from the last few months.

Mia made this at school for Mother's Day. I love her little hand prints! It is still up on our refrigerator, and she will often point to it and say "My hands Mommy!"

Mia made this at church for Mother's Day. It's her little thumbprints made to look like butterflies and a flower. It said "Thumbody loves you" inside. How cute!
Lily colored this hat. She loves to use all available crayons when she colors and make "rainbow pictures."

Lily was so proud of herself after coloring this treasure chest picture (I love the Word World tv show and coloring book!). She wrote both of our names on it, and said it was for me. She was so excited about it, she found the tape and proceeded to tape it up on our bedroom wall. It's been there about 3 months now because I don't want to take it down and Lily think we don't like it!

We all love the Alex Little Hands art project kits. Each kit has within it 4 or 5 individually wrapped art projects. I think that is a great idea! When Borders went out of business a few months ago, I stocked up on these during their sale. This is Mia's ladybug from their "Paper Plate Kit." The other paper plate insects that we made were a bumblebee, spider, butterfly and caterpillar.

This was Lily's free-style drawing of a tree with a couple of flowers. I think it is very funny that when Lily runs out of room (by running into a flower), she just continues writing a word below where she started. Like me, she doesn't like for things to overlap.

This is a mosaic Lily made. The circus design was already prepared, and she followed the pattern to lay down the correct stickers. She had a lot of fun with this too.

Both girls love to paint too. Here's one of Mia's paintings from our Thomas the Train paint book.

Lily made this rainbow about 6 months ago at church. She loved using the "colored Cheerios" (she had no idea they were Fruit Loops) to make her rainbow. She said her favorite part was trying all the colors before gluing them down!

Liz found a set of cool crowns to use in art projects. The girls love putting stickers on them. Liz told me that Lily took this crown and these stickers to her room at one point, and when she came back out, she had written her name in stickers on it.

Lily's recent cat coloring. She said she left it blank between her eyes because some cats have a white patch right there. So apparently she was trying to go for realistic...okay!

I love this little giraffe coloring! Not only do I like the heart that Lily drew, but I love that she colored every one of the hairs on the giraffe's mane a different color. I'm telling you, she will really concentrate to get her picture just the way she wants it!

Swim Lessons

We signed the girls up to take swim lessons this summer. I should have done this last year for Lily, but I never found any close by at a reasonable rate. However, this year, a lady in our neighborhood sent an email that she was opening her pool up and her 3-year-old daughter's swim instructor was offering group lessons on Wednesday evening. Since our church doesn't do Wednesday night activities during the summer, this works great!

When we went to the Henderson's house on Monday evening, Lily didn't want to get in the pool at all until she realized she could touch the bottom of the shallow end and walk around. She and Mia were both terrified of putting their faces in the water. Needless to say, this made me dread the first swim lesson which was on Wednesday! However, both girls took a few minutes to relax in the pool and then they did great! Mia did a great job of kicking her feet and blowing bubbles underwater. Lily amazed me at how quickly she picked up on paddling, blowing bubbles and kicking her feet. She was even excited to go completely underwater after about 20 minutes! Obviously, it will take more practice, but I think she is going to be swimming like a fish before we know it! I'm looking forward to a fun summer in the pool!

Miscellaneous Pictures

Lily loves the Belle and Tinkerbell dolls that Amy gave the girls for Christmas. Both girls "dancing" with their dolls in the playroom.

Watching Daddy put the swimming pool on our back deck.
Happy girl!

Lily loves to color, and she has gotten really good at it. I love seeing her creativity coming out as she colors and does all sorts of art projects.

When we picked Mia up on the last day of school last Monday, she was sound asleep in her high chair after lunch. They said she had played hard on the playground that morning, and was worn out. We also realized she had managed to sneak one of her Glow Worms to school that morning.

Precious!

When Life Hands You Ripe Bananas...

Make Chocolate-Chip Banana Bites with your girls! Throw some Mickey Mouse picks on top, and see how fast they get gobbled up.

As Lily was looking through one of her cookbooks (where could she possibly have learned that habit...?), I saw a recipe for these little muffins. Since we had a few ripe bananas on hand, we decided to make them this morning. The girls love to help me cook, and they did a great job taking turns with mashing the bananas, pouring in the ingredients and stirring. I hope they will both continue this love of cooking!

Lily's Graduation

Last Monday was the girls' last day of Parent Morning Out. Since Lily was in the oldest class and will go on to Pre-K next year, they had a graduation service for the kids in that class. Ryan, Mom and I went to watch. The kids were all so excited! They looked adorable in their little mortarboard hats too. Here's a picture of Lily happily talking to her friend Sierra before the ceremony started.
The director, Mary Jane, spoke for a few minutes and welcomed everyone. Then Ms. Mollett and Ms. Amanda walked onto the stage. They called each child's name and said a few kind words about each one. Here's Lily receiving her certificate from Ms. Amanda.

Showing off her certificate to everyone.

Congratulations!

Lily has been attending Bethany's Parent Morning Out for three years. It was a little rough in the very beginning, but she soon grew to love it. She loved going to school where she could play with friends, do art projects, learn songs and all sorts of fun things. We have been very pleased with this program, and we're thankful for how great they have been to our girls. Lily will start the 5 day a week half-day Pre-K at Atlanta Classical Christian Academy next year, and while we're all excited about this change, some of us (that would be me) can't believe my precious Lily is big enough to start "real" school! I just can't wait to see what this amazing little one's future holds!

Teacher Appreciation

Liz had this great gift idea for the girls' teachers for "Teacher Appreciation Week." Each girl picked out a flower for their teachers (they both have two teachers). On one side of the pot, I wrote "Thanks for Helping Me Grow," and on the other side "Love, Lily Hooks 2011" or "Love, Mia Hooks 2011." Then I just put a few dots around the top. They were so cute, and they turned out great!