Bailee is THREE

I am headed to GA to celebrate my precious Bailee's 3rd birthday. She is an angel. I love this sweet baby so much!
She and Tina came and stayed with us for a week in October. Bailee's daddy (a Marine) has been traveling a lot the last two months and he was going to be gone for the whole week so Tina decided to come to town and spend that week with friends and family.
Unfortunately I had to work a lot during that time. I worked a couple of really late nights trying to clear my schedule for Friday so I could be off and spend the whole day with my Bailee-boo before they left the next day. Friday was our day...YaYa & Bailee. I laughed so much that day. The things she says are hilarious!

She is trying to smell my flowers in my butterfly garden.

Bailee and my puppy Raven are "best friends." She calls him Ray-Ray. Here she is tickled because of one of Ray-Ray's habits...drinking out of my birdbath!
After she watched the dog drinking from the birdbath she decided she would play in it too and she proceeded to make leaf soup for my birdies.
We had the chance to visit the fair while they were in town...Bailee loved the petting zoo! (Poor bunny!)
She enjoyed the big ferris wheel until we reached the top everytime and then she snuggled close to her mommy...it was extremely windy that day and the wind was much worse the higher we went.
Her daddy is going to be out of town this weekend working so he won't be there for her birthday party. He took his little princess out for a date one night this week. She was so excited to go out with her daddy!

Working, working, working

If you've been reading my blog for very long, you know I have a daughter living in Hawaii. She's married to a military guy and they have 3 little boys. They are waiting to find out anyday now where their next duty station is going to be and we are all hoping and praying it's going to be here in town where I live. She hasn't lived in the same town as us the last 4-5 years so this would be a wonderful change.

My son-in-law has to go out on his ship the first of December and stay out for four months. He will miss two of his son's birthdays and Christmas. Felicia was really down thinking about spending all of that time without her husband and family around...especially through the holidays and birthdays.

Greg and I decided we are going to go out there to Hawaii this year for the holidays. We've made a plan and we are working towards it. I've been trying to pick up more work in merchandising to pay for the plane tickets and I've been totally and completely amazed at all the work that's been coming my way. God is so good!! I am so thankful and feel blessed beyond words. I love the work I'm doing and I can not wait to get back to Hawaii to see my precious grandbabies!!

DoDoMan

Meet DoDoMan...



He looks vaguely similar to my son Dakota doesn't he (underneath all that hair anyway)!?

Last week when my 2-yr-old granddaughter, Bailee, was staying with me we were attending Vacation Bible School every evening at church. Our VBS starts on Sunday nights and runs through Thursdays with the commencement on Friday. The youth have a choice of helping at VBS or going off-site to somebody's house to swim, eat and have a Bible study of their own. Dakota stayed at church to help on Sunday and went off-site the rest of the week.

When the activities were over Sunday evening I picked Bailee up from her classroom and took her into the closing ceremony. She loved going in there every evening and dancing and watching the kids sing and dance.
After it was over I told her we needed to go find "Kotaman" - I am in the habit of calling Dakota -- "Kotaman."

He was in another building helping the teachers set up for the next night. When we walked in and saw him in there Bailee said in her very loud voice "Dere he is! DoDoMan!!"

Due to the laughter and cute reaction she received from calling him that, she has now decided that is his permanent name.

My daughter & her boys

No words needed here...aren't they a beautiful family?

Wordless Wednesday - Bailee's Prize - Lipstick

For more Wordless Wednesday posts, visit 5 Minutes for Mom

Georgia on my mind...

My son-in-law, who is in the Marines and stationed in GA, had to travel to San Antonio last week. My daughter asked me to come visit her while he was away so Dakota and I headed up there last Tuesday. Mom drove us up on Tuesday and she stayed one night before driving back home on Wednesday. That was her first visit up there.

Tina's next door neighbor has 6 or 7 dogs. They just got a new miniature dauschund (I think that's what this dog is) and Bailee absolutely adores this dog. She asks her mom to go get "baby doggie" all the time.
She is a little excited watching Dakota roll around on the ground with the dogs....
The next day, after mom left to travel back home, we drove to downtown Albany and visited the Flint RiverQuarium and surrounding park area. The weather was perfect outside!
In Pensacola where I live, we have large Pelicans (painted like this) all over our downtown area. I love turtles!! I've collected them forever. I thought this was pretty cool to see these painted turtles all over downtown Albany.Bailee talked me into climbing around in the tunnels with her - oh man, I am way too old for this! But I can't resist those precious eyes of her!Could you resist those eyes?? "Pweeaassee YaYa??? Come wif me!"
When I was in Hawaii last month, Felicia ordered a picture for Tina as a surprise from Kodak Gallery. The picture was from when Tina and Bailee had visited Felicia in Hawaii in 2007 and Felicia snapped a picture of Bailee. She enlarged the picture and had it shipped directly to Tina - she wasn't sure how it had turned out. Tina loved it! When I saw it, I was amazed at how beautiful it was and how big it was - I had Bailee sit next to it and took a picture of the picture so Felicia could see it framed.Bailee was watching me pull my hair back and I asked her if she wanted me to fix her hair too. After I pulled her hair back she wanted to see herself in the mirror and then she happily posed for a picture.On Friday we went to Chuckee Cheese for lunch (Bailee's favorite place to eat) and she is happily turning in her tickets to see how many she has and what prizes she can get...
The prize? Lovely purple lipstick, fake earrings and necklace set - she's a happy little lady. She looks sad in this picture but she is actually falling asleep....she's in the "zone" - ya know halfway between awake and asleep. LOL

Pink Bunny Girlie-Girl

Tina, Bryant and my grand-daughter Bailee came into town for the weekend. Bryant's sister and brother-in-law (and their 3 little girls) are moving this week and they came into town to celebrate Easter together with his mom one last time before all her grandkids officially move away. Bailee and her two older cousins had a blast hunting eggs and playing together. The youngest one is still an infant.

Tina and Bailee got away for a little while Sunday morning to come to church and see us. When Tina called me between Sunday School and church to let me know she was on her way she got my sleepy voice on the other end of the phone...she had just woke me up. With the change of daylight savings time, Greg having to work until 11:00 a.m., and my late night Saturday night I had overslept and didn't make it to church. They detoured to our house instead.

Bailee is all dressed up for church....she is such a prissy girl (her mommy is MAKING her a girlie-girl!!) LOL She carried her little purse around the whole time she was at our house!

Momma and her prissy girl - they are both adorable!

Anniversaries

My twin daughters both celebrate their wedding anniversaries in February. This was not planned. Felicia and Will had a big wedding on Valentine's Day 5 years ago. Tina and Bryant eloped three years ago before he left for Iraq...they didn't even pay attention to what the date was.

It was only afterwards when Felicia pointed it out to Tina that their anniversaries were 3 days apart did Tina realize what she had done. We jokingly refer to that as "the twin thing."

Happy Anniversary Will and Felicia - congratulations on 5 years together! I love you both!

This is their family a couple years ago before they moved to Hawaii.

Allan and Nathan in Hawaii (now) - they are 5 and 3 yrs old

Will and Felicia in Fall 2008 before baby #3 was born

My 3rd grandson - Shawn William born in December 2008

Happy Anniversary Bryant and Tina - congratulations on three years together!! I love you both!!
Even though Bryant and Tina eloped, once he returned from Iraq, they had a small wedding on the beach for friends and family (because WE all wanted it!) - they did it to make us happy.

Now they have their Bailee-boo (Daddy's little girl)...

The many faces of Bailee...

Tina, Bryant and Bailee came in town this past weekend. Since I was out of town in Gatlinburg until Saturday I only got to see them real quick when we met for lunch - as they were on their way out of town.

Bailee is turning into such a "drama queen" - she cracks me up! I love all the faces she makes!