Fourth of July the Brooke way.

All of our friends have been posting really beautiful, sweet pictures of their children on the Fourth of July. I decided to post pictures of our child as she is.....precious, priceless, beautiful and last but not least ORNERY. She has been digging through boxes as I open them, drawers as I fill them and yesterday although she was dressed like a patriotic angel....found the bubba teeth my dad sent us a long time ago. The rest I will just describe as a few of the faces of Brooke.

Later in the evening Steven had sat down to relax for the first time that day and Minnie Mouse had to climb in his lap for some good cuddling time.

Once a Daddy's Girl, always a Daddy's Girl.

We let Brooke stay up WAY past her bed time so we could see some fireworks. I know, we supposedly live out in the country now, but we saw the best free fireworks show we have seen in YEARS right in our front yard. We are right across the street from the Baptist Church here and their big parking lot made for a great place for our neighbors to pop their expensive fireworks. We were outside from 9:30 until 11 (when Brooke finally pooped out) and they were still going strong when we came in! It was great, and made me thankful for the rain because we didn't have to worry about them at all. The best thing of all, other than my wonderful family of course, is that in this great house we couldn't even hear them.....so, Brooke fell asleep and wasn't bothered at all by the chaos outside.

Still trying to catch up.

I am trying to give the grandparents a little bit of a Brooke fix with all of these postings. She is still growing like a weed. I look at her sprawled out, long legs dangling off of things and realize I don't have a baby anymore. She is very independent, most days.....but this move has sort of made her a major momma's girl lately. She has been begging me to sit down and let her lay on me and watch cartoons with her, which is something she rarely did before the chaos of the move.

She is still very much a princess. She wants to wear nothing but dresses, leggings, night gowns, etc. She won't even wear a shirt unless it spins when she twirls around. She seems to be very healthy, and cracks me up all the time. We try to eat healthy all the time around here, but on occasion we like to have something sweet or fried. I asked her today after lunch if she would like a chocolate chip cookie and she said, "Momma, those are yummy but that cantaloupe would be SO much better for us and is still yummy!" Yes, I got the point and we've been eating cantaloupe all day.

Back to the home ownership responsibilities. Steven wants his house COOL. This one wouldn't stay cool enough to keep him comfortable, so he (with Uncle Bro's help in this pic) has already managed to spray tons of insulation in our attic. The new air conditioner and heater will be here tomorrow.

Even when I am exhausted and cranky, this little girl still knows how to melt my heart. She has been such a doll through all of this change.

After the move, I finally found my camera.

Since I packed my camera, and was too worn out to worry about it. I don't have many new house pictures just yet. I am working on it. I suppose I am enough of a neat freak that I don't WANT to take pictures for you before I have things the way I want them, but I will do it anyway.....because it will take me a while to peel wallpaper, paint, hang things on walls and of course UNPACK! I realize it took us nearly a month to pack all these boxes, but I have been killing myself trying to unpack them all in this first week. Yesterday my body finally told me to stop, and I had a day of playing with my sweetie pie. We both needed it. She has been feeling nearly neglected by Momma unpacking and organizing instead of giving her my undivided attention! ;o)

RAIN, we have had a LOT of rain since we moved into our new house. I call it our NEW house only because it is new to US! It was built in 1966, so it has lots of updates we will want to do as we have time and more importantly can afford to, but nothing was structurally wrong with this awesome huge house. I love it out here too. It's so quiet, the people are all so very friendly, and Brooke can do things like this in our front yard without us freaking out about crazy people driving by at 50 miles an hour!

I love this picture because look how her eyes are shut so tightly. She knew she was making a HUGE mess and getting her white tights muddy, but hey.....I wasn't about to stop her fun! This time.

Just enjoying the only sunshine we saw in nearly 5 days. I don't know about the City of Lubbock, but here in New Home we got nearly 10 inches of rain. We didn't mind it until we discovered about 4 days into the rain that our roof has a funky pooling leak. Ugh, yes.....the down fall of home ownership is responsibility!! Steven managed to fix the leak enough to stop it, but of course we are going to let professionals fix it now to prevent this from happening again.

Little Miss Brooke is super proud of "her new big house" and I have almost had to bribe her to get her to willingly drive into Lubbock with me. She loves it out here!

Before the move.

I am really behind on posting anything since the craziness of our move started, so I will warn you now I am just getting started!

Old house, last minute of relaxation before the couch and other furniture started disappearing!

How we spent too many days. I think it was only two, but those days were so very hectic they seemed longer than standard 24 hour days!

Daddy had sweetly promised Brooke that he would make her a make shift tent for our last few nights in the old house. Since I didn't know about this promise I managed to pack up most of the supplies that would have made a really cool tent, but Brooke thought this tent rocked!

A couple more lessons worth sharing.

Yep, being taught by a four year old on a regular basis again. I really think I have learned more important lessons since I have been out of college!




I have learned at some point in parenthood you will end up convincing your child to do something you have been telling her NOT to do since day one. Insert me cramming my own child in our doggie door. Yes, you read right. Ever since she started crawling it was always "Brooke, we do not go out that door....you are not a dog." But, when Brooke and her Momma are outside in nothing but swim suits and Daddy manages to 'accidentally' lock us out.....Momma begs Brooke to let me help her through the door so she can let us in. If she wouldn't have agreed to me cramming her in the door sideways I would have had to walk my swimsuit wearing self around the alley, busy side street at 5:00, and into our garage. Yes, Brooke is my hero!

And my latest lesson learned, I haven't even begun to appreciate yet....it might take a while. I have learned that my cell phone IS safer in my four year old's hands than it is......let's say for grins.....stuffed in my bathing suit top.....as I hop in the pool.....and approximately 30 minutes later as I decide to stand up I finally hear it "blub, blub, bleep" and realize what happened it is already far too late to take it apart and dry it out. Yes.....I was without a cell phone for days, which was punishment enough.....but I decided to share my story to make Steven feel as though you guys laughing at me is also punishment. ;o) It was so far gone that the phone place couldn't even transfer my contacts.....WOW.....that is going to take a while.

In the midst of the move....

On the exact same day I posted to our blog about Brooke being satisfied with our tiny pool, a very sweet Daddy came home with one we can all enjoy. Never before have I had any desire to own an above ground pool, BUT now I can say it was worth every penny and I have enjoyed it as much as a certain little girl. It has been awesome to be able to pack until my fingers hurt, then go out in our own backyard and chill in this pool.

I have always been told that as a mom you have to 'pick your battles' with your child. Fashion tends to be one of those battles I choose not to fight....it's all opinion anyway, so even though this was a 100 degree day, I totally let Brooke go visit our new Post Office in New Home with leg warmers on. And I completely giggled at all of the people (all two of them) that saw her and proceeded to look at ME like I was off my rocker. What a way to get people in our new small town to notice us new folk! ;o)

We took time away from moving this weekend to go to our sweet neighbor Aiden's birthday party at a really cool pool here in town. I was thrilled Steven went with us because he is not timid at all in the water, so he and Brooke went down all the slides together and with her Daddy right behind her I saw her slowly loosening up in the water.

Posing on the alligator....gotta love it!

Fashion, part 2. Last night while we were packing, Brooke was in her room digging through the boxes I had already packed but hadn't sealed. She found some red thick pantyhose and put them on herself, with her black dress shoes and wore them all evening. Stylin'!

To acknowledge all of the sweet people who have offered to help entertain Brooke during our move. I have to say Thank you very much, but I want to explain why I am not jumping on all of the offers. Steven and I both want Brooke, and even our dog Cooper to be a part of this move and not be confused by what is going on. I don't want us to move Brooke's stuff out of her room one morning and just walk her in her new, set up room that evening. I want her to help decide where to put things, see her stuff being set up, and just all in all being a part of the big day. So, thank you again very much for your wonderful offers......but we selfishly still want Brooke there with us to see it all unfolding! We have enlisted the help of Brooke's wonderful grandmother's to help keep her safely involved and out of the way of moving furniture.

Another lesson learned.

This parenthood thing is tough! Brooke manages to teach me some really good lessons on a daily basis, so I will share a few of the easier to type about lessons.

I mentioned to Facebook followers the morning I got out of the shower to discover Miss Brooke had scaled our computer desk, gotten out a roll of stamps and proceeded to stick approximately $35 worth of stamps all over our real estate paperwork. I was not even aggravated about the stamps, because I could peel them off and reuse them. I was aggravated about the fact that she had to climb in an office chair with wheels on top of a desk to get them, and my thoughts of what could have happened took me straight to the emergency room! Lesson learned, just because she looks like she is six doesn't mean she's going to act like she is six and I still have to treat her like the toddler she is!!

To all of my curly haired friends who gripe about the humidity and the frizz. Well, I have never had this problem, so I have never had to deal with it. And now that my daughter has TONS of this curly hair, I think the frizz is quite precious. So, I don't know what you're griping about....hehe.

Look how those frizzy curls frame her face. Love them! She is singing, and growing......

This pool is smaller than the one she played in last year, but our bigger one is somewhere packed neatly away awaiting transfer to our new house. Another lesson learned recently. Just because I think the pool is tiny does not mean that she cannot have TONS of fun in it! Kids do not seem to care the size of the pool, as long as they can get wet, eat popsicles, splash and run around. So, I am learning not to worry about things as much, she will find a way to have fun in any situation.

Note more frizzy, precious curls.....and modeling of swimsuit #1. I always get her long tankini's so she is covered, but so she can wear the same one all summer long and also to ease potty breaks. The suits from last year do show a hint of the belly, but they work for our backyard just perfectly!

Her new and favorite swimsuit. Imagine this, it's PURPLE. My side note here is will you look at those going on forever legs?! I got told by four different people this morning alone that she does NOT look four.

Our dog Cooper knows better than to stay still while Brooke is around. I think he still has flashbacks from certain clothing articles being placed on him. But, my in laws dog Nipper hasn't learned to run just yet. Here he is investigating....thinking about giving her sugar.

Brooke still has to wear a flower or a bow in her hair. Many mornings I try to get away with a simple pony tail or wild pig tails like the one's in the picture, and every single time she gets a flower and puts it on herself.

I know, I could have posted a later picture with her wet hair out of her face. But, once again I am enjoying the beauty of those frizzy curls. I still don't see why you gripe about them. ;o)

Here is the 'after' picture anyway.

We have been loving the heat, or should I rephrase and say finding ways to make the heat as much fun as possible!

Our big move is about two weeks away! We are seeing things pack up and disappear!