Hunting Island

It's been so cold here. I know you are all thinking "well duh, it's winter" but our little southern blood can't handle the cold. The flu and other illnesses are making their rounds. I HATE when Brynn gets sick as I'm sure most of you mamas understand. So we've been laying low and kicking it at home to avoid the germs but the cabin fever is getting so real y'all. 

By Sunday Brad could tell I needed to get out of the house decided we would hop in the car and head to Hunting Island State Park. It was a little bit of a drive but we've kind of become pros at road trips. This time we spent our drive going through questions on the app "Gottman Card Decks" since we timed it so Brynn would nap the whole drive! We haven't gone through all the decks but we really like this app, and it's great for couples to get to know each other better. Absolutely recommend this app as a tool for building a better relationship with your spouse. 

The drive was so pretty and we were absolutely in love with Hunting Island and the light house there. Such a fun little day trip. We had fun walking along the beach with all the driftwood trees and Brynn loved collecting shells and rocks (she stashed some in her pockets that we discovered once we got home). This area got hit pretty hard by Hurricane Irma but we were still in awe of its beauty. The facilities there are so nice and clean and we are sad that we are just now discovering this gem. We will be returning!! 

Target Haul

If you are anything like me you walk into Target with only one thing on your list and walk out with a million other things and end up forgetting the one thing you went in to buy. When I go to Target I ALWAYS have to stop in their little dollar section. Which if we are all being honest here, most things are $3-$5 now but that section has some great stuff. I was expecting it to be all Valentines Day stuff but I ended up finding some great things for Brynn and thought I would share with my fellow mamas! I immediately sent a text to Brad saying "I'm just going to go ahead and apologize for all the money I'm about to spend at Target" because let's be honest Target takes all my money.

I realize that all of these items could be made super easily but let's be honest when I have down time I would rather take a nap or binge watch The Office on Netflix! I can't be the only one?!

Anyways, the first thing I found was this little mail set. Guys, I am obsessed. I love that Brynn will be able to use this for a few years. I am planning on buying one of those little mailboxes so that she can put the envelopes in there. I laminated the letter cards so that they will be more durable and so she can re-use them again and again.

The next thing I found was this little bubble gum machine which was perfect because I'm really trying to work on teaching Brynn her colors. Brynn loves matching the colors!

Another fun learning tool is this cute little cookie and oven for number recognition. This is too advanced for Brynn right now but she still loves putting the little cookies on the pan and putting it in the little oven.

The last thing I found was this adorable finger puppet set! They had a farm and zoo set as well (I'm trying to convince Brad I need to go back and buy them, haha). Brynn loves it and I love hearing her make the little dragon roar!

I love that with most of the things I found she can play with them now and later they can help her to learn as well. I love seeing what other people pick up at Target so if you've found something recently that you are obsessed with share with me because chances are I'll make another target run just to get that item! haha.

Embrace

Last year in addition to making 3 goals for the new year I also chose a word/phrase to focus on. My phrase last year was "be present". This was something that for me personally I really needed to focus on. I had found myself mindlessly scrolling social media instead of enjoying the time with family and friends. I would pack my calendar as full as I could which ultimately lead me to not being able to focus on a task at hand because my mind would be running a million miles a minute just thinking of all that I had committed to. I knew that needed to change so I made "be present" my motto for the year. I am not going to sit here and tell you I was perfect at it but I did get better about putting my phone down so that I could create better memories with my family and friends. I stopped saying "yes" to every little thing so that I could be present physically and mentally for the things and people who matter most to me. 

I saw a difference in my life because of that little phrase and knew that I wanted to pick a word again this year that would help me improve as a person. I bounced around a few different words and I kept coming back to the word EMBRACE. 

2018 is going to be a big year for us, full of lots of change. It will be full of ups and downs because let's be honest, every year is. I'm not always great with change. I can be kind of a control freak so when things don't go according to my plans I tend to freak out and the anxiety kicks in. 

That is the main reason I chose the word embrace. I really want to focus on WELCOMING all the change instead of freaking out about it and getting stressed out.

Embrace also means to take or clasp in the arms, to encircle, to surround. These are all things I want to focus on when it comes to my loved ones. With all the tragedies and illnesses in the world, I want to truly embrace my loved ones. I would hate for something bad to happen to someone I love and always have to question if they knew how much they meant to me. 

I would love to hear what your goals for the year are (I'm still working on coming up with mine) or if you also have a word/motto for the year and feel like sharing, I would love to hear (maybe I'll even use it in the future!)

Southern Snow Day

Wow! I can't believe I haven't blogged since May. That's probably the longest stretch. Shame on me. Anyways, here we are welcoming 2018!  I believe this year is going to be full of all kinds of magic. For starters, we got snow here in Charleston yesterday. Yes, you read that right. SNOW in CHARLESTON. All day long my mind was blown. Never thought I would see palm trees and snowflakes together.

We had a prediction of snow for a little over a week and I kept thinking yeah yeah yeah, that's never going to happen. Well Wednesday morning arrives and we had a little play date with our neighbor in the morning. Once they left, we started getting a little sleet and I thought that would be it. Just a little bit of ice.

Well I put Brynn down for a nap around noon and then I look out the window and I see HUGE flakes falling from sky. I sit there thinking okay it's snowing but there is no way it's going to stick. Well as the next hour went by it really started to stick. The news predicted us getting 2-4 inches but nothing more. You guys we got 6.5 inches of snow.

When Brynn woke up from her nap we took her out to experience snow for the first time. At that point we only had about half an inch on the ground but it was coming down hard. Needless to say she hated it. She would stand so still and just cry.

I snapped a few pictures just to document the day in case that was all we got and it melted fast. Thankfully, we got more snow as the day went on and we decided to take Brynn out again. Brad showed her how to pick up snow and throw it and all of a sudden she was in love with it.

We played for a little bit and then came back inside and spent the rest of the day sipping hot chocolate and reading books.

When Brynn woke up this morning she ran to the window and saw the snow and said "snow, play, let's go" and ran to put her boots on. So we bundled her up and went on a little adventure around our complex. It still blows my mind that we got snow here but I loved the extra time we had with Brad and the memories that we made!

May Recap

May was a really busy month for us. I feel like we spent the majority of it in the car or entertaining visitors! During the month of May we made two different trips to Georgia, both for graduations.

 At the beginning of the month we went for my sisters college graduation from the University of Georgia! We got to be there for a week because Brad actually did an externship that week so Brynn and I got to play while he worked all day. My niece, Zoe, was also in town so it was extra fun. We went to the zoo, had s'mores, and went "camping" in my parents living room.

Exactly a week after going home for my sisters graduation we found our selves sitting in urgent care with Brynn. She had a 104 degree fever. It was terrifying and we didn't get many answers as to what the cause was. She was so pitiful. They gave us lots of tips as to how to keep her temp down. At the same time we were in urgent care, my parents were on their way with my grandpa to visit for the weekend. Brynn was snuggled all weekend long as we tried to get her back to feeling well. I snuck away for a little bit to take my grandpa to Patriots Point. I'm so thankful that Brynn was in good hands while I was gone and that I got to soak up precious time with my Grandpa. My family left that Sunday, and then we "celebrated" mother's day. We still had a sick baby so it was full of sad snuggles. 2 days later Brynn broke out in a crazy rash, so I took her in. Turns out poor baby had Roseola. My heart still breaks when I think of how sad and pitiful she was that whole weekend. Thankfully she got better pretty quick and the whole thing lasted from Friday-Wednesday.

Two weeks later we found ourselves back in Georgia for Brad's youngest brother's high school graduation. Brynn stayed with her Honey & Dude while we attended the graduation ceremony and then the next day we went over to Brad's parents for a graduation party. We went swimming and played games outside and Brynn had a fun time with her cousins.

When we got back to Charleston we went to the Children's Museum for the first time with our friends Jillian and Benjamin. Brynn had such a fun time splashing at the water station and taking everything off the shelves in the mini grocery store.

May sure was fun and busy month for our little family. We also said goodbye to friends whose Dental School journey was over! It's so crazy to think that we will be the one's leaving at the end of the school year.

Smash Cake Photo Session

While my family was in town for Brynn's birthday back in April we did a cute little smash cake photo session. Brynn ate way too much cake that week between her actual birthday, her party, and this little photo session so I think she was a little burned out by the end of the week. But we still got some cute pictures of her. 

Brynn's birthday party was BBQ themed but I wanted something different for her cake smash session. My friend has a little girl who is a few weeks older than Brynn and she had the cutest backdrop from her smash cake session so I asked where she got it and it was actually just bulletin board paper form JoAnns. So my mom bought the paper and then we went from there. I found this really cute mint green cake plate in the Target dollar section and just had to get it. Mint green just speaks to me. So we went with mint and then because my sister, Colby, had mint green as one of her wedding colors we were able to borrow her bunting. So the whole thing was really affordable and turned out super cute!

I can't believe Brynn is already 15 months. I've been the worst about blogging so I'm going to be playing catch up for a little bit.

A BBQ Birthday

We decided to have a combined Barbeque Birthday party for Brynn along with her little friends, all born within the same week. The "triplets" initials are B-B-Q so we thought it was rather fitting. To be honest the whole thing stressed me out probably more than it should've. I feel like because of pinterest and social media there is this bar that is set for any and all parties/celebrations.

We decided to have the party at Hampton Park at noon. We get to the day of the party and the park is closed to traffic. I start stressing because I wanted to make sure we had a nice shady spot since it is the south and it gets hot in April and I wanted to set up and make it all cute before the guests arrived.

I wish I had gotten better pictures of the decorations. All the credit goes to my mom. She really came through to make sure the party was adorable. On the menu was pulled pork sliders, veggies, potato salad, fruit, and chips. We had a cake for everyone to eat along with smash cakes for all the babies.

It was a really fun time to have everyone together but I'm looking forward to a much simpler party next year!