Life With a Princess.

Life with a Princess is NEVER dull. Always dramatic, loving and adorable.

This is how our Princess walked out of her room this morning after I woke her up. Tutu under her princess nightgown, wild morning hair, one of the two pair of shoes her Daddy helped us find for school and her princess cd player blaring what else.....princess music!

The best part is she came out saying "Momma, I am ready to go to school now!" Um, I am hoping to NOT have a battle on our hands for the first day of school.....but I promise she will be able to dress girly!

I read in a magazine article just a day or so ago that allowing your child to express her creativity through clothing at an early age will just help her develop her own style, personality and opinions; help her stand out in a crowd; and help her figure out who SHE is......so, that's my story and I am sticking to it....she's 'finding herself.'

Why I dislike allergies.....

I agree 100% with all the mom's that I have heard say they cannot stand it when their 'babies' are sick. Allergy season is apparently in full bloom here. Our sweet Brooke tossed and turned, hardly able to breathe last night and woke up this morning MISERABLE! Sneezing, itchy/watery eyes (so bad it looks like she is crying), runny nose and she has been wiping and blowing it so much that her little nose is already raw.

She is still smiling for the camera, and totally acts normal.....in spurts. Her energy goes quickly, then she comes and cuddles for a while then has another spurt of energy.

This picture shows why I dislike allergies. Look at her poor nose, she can't breathe and the dark circles under her eyes are horrible! It makes this momma sad!

Yes, I am going to call about a second opinion for allergy testing at age 4. I have heard of kids that did it a lot younger, yet our doc doesn't seem to encourage it at all. Will keep you posted, I am off to find some kleenex with lotion in them!

Fun at Nana and Paw's.

Brooke, Cooper and myself took the drive to Plainview Thursday morning to spend a day with Nana and Paw. We try to do this regularly, but hadn't since we moved to our new place.....and with school about to start it was time.

Brooke loves going to their house, because they are typical grandparents. They let her do anything short of hurting someone. Here she is showing her grandparents how to run the website playhouse disney....her favorite, and yes she is getting quite good at navigating computers on her own already....yikes!

Nana is super creative and crafty, so when we go see her she always has some 'project' for Brooke to help her with. We walk in the door and Brooke asks "What are we going to do this time Nana?"

Here they are painting bird houses. Brooke is acquiring her Nana's love of birds, so she loved getting to make them some pretty new houses. Yes, they will be in our back yard soon enough.

Their finished bird houses.

I don't remember the crafty term, but Nana got some wooden letters in Brooke's initials and the two of them covered these letters with bright fabric. The finished project already hanging in Brooke's room.

The funniest part to me about visits with grandparents is when we get home. This is how far Brooke made it from the car.......she was worn out from all of the fun!

Just some fun....

Last week, my sweet in laws came to stay with Brooke so Steven and I could have a date night. I love this time alone with my hubby, uninterrupted conversation can do wonders for feeling connected! For those of you who think we now live in a one horse town, you are extremely mistaken....people are outnumbered by the horses here, and we even have one restaurant! Nana and Paw took Brooke to the one restaurant for dinner in what else, the golf cart! I could hear her jabbering and giggling the entire way. The cutest part is that I couldn't tell who was having more fun, Brooke or her grandparents!

Back with dinner, and a few smiles!

My vicious first born, Cooper. Story behind him being snaggle toothed, we were wrestling and I accidentally knocked a tooth out.....um, ooooooopppppssss. He didn't squeal or anything, but now I giggle at the fact that I literally knocked his tooth out.

Some friends we've missed came over for a playdate earlier in the week. Here are the princesses, Brooke and Brooklyn. They played for HOURS and we hardly heard anything out of them....besides normal girl giggles, screams and squeals of course.

Paying for one's raising.

To truly understand the term 'paying for your raising' you have to have had a four year old opinionated little person living with you. For starters, I always try to blame Steven and HIS raising any time Brooke decides to throw a fit, cop an attitude or pretty much anything else I think I can pin on him.....because we ALL know I was such an angel growing up.....hahahem. BUT, one thing I am pretty sure I can claim all on my own is how she is so very opinionated about her clothes, her hair and of course her shoes.

First off, I love it that she IS opinionated about her own style. To me, that just makes her that much more fun. BUT, I didn't think about how much fun (being sarcastic here) it would be when trying to shop for shoes besides flip flops for back to school. I am pretty sure I have shared with you guys before that over a year ago she was a tom boy who wanted to wear jeans every where we went, then suddenly (after I decorated several pair of jeans for her) she decided to completely STOP wearing jeans, and basically pants all together. She still only wants to wear dresses, skirts and leggings. Maybe it's all about comfort, but I think it's all about being girly. It's been a lot of fun shopping for her school clothes, because anyone that knows me knows I now spend all shopping attention on her.

Insert yesterday. We had a little time to kill while in Lubbock before her back to school hair trim (more detail on that to come), so we went shoe shopping. I know she doesn't need to wear our daily staple, flip flops, to school so Steven and I figured she needs some tennis shoes. OH BOY......I tried and tried and tried to get her to try on so many cute pair of tennis shoes....and I failed miserably. The only pair she tried on at all was three sizes too big, and when I found it in the right size she had already lost interest. The truth of the matter is that normal ole tennis shoes wouldn't go with her girly outfits all that much, I agree.....but I was thinking when she started school she would see her jean wearing classmates and decide to try them again. I think I was wrong. I won't go into any more detail for the fear of totally boring you, but see the picture below to see the ONLY pair of shoes she would have anything to do with. They are black, moccasin looking, rubber soled shoes. And yes, she is wearing them around the house with her sun dress this morning "breaking them in". The truth is they go so well with her girly personality and her girly wardrobe. My question is why do I try to fight it?!

On to the hair cut story. You all know I am not exactly one for dramatic hair cuts....clearly. But, I have been explaining to Brooke that we need to get our hair trimmed regularly to keep it healthy. She was excited at first for her 7th or 8th hair cut, yes I have lost count.....oops. This was what she WANTED to wear to get her hair cut. I did over rule this and made her choose just one flower.

Then we got to the hair place, and while Randy was cutting her hair her eyes started welling up with tears. I figured it was during what should have been her nap time, or he was pulling her hair or something.....but when I asked her she simply said "Momma, I wanted my hair LONGER not SHORTER" and started crying. She did get almost two full inches cut off, and yes it seems dramatic to Brooke and myself this humid morning.....but I keep telling her it is so much easier to comb through without the dry ends and that it WILL grow back!

Here she is with the two inches off her hair. No one besides her Momma would probably even notice!

Since our shoe shopping fun yesterday I have been looking online to try to find some shoes she might wear, and so far she has picked out a purple pair of moccasin looking shoes just like the ones she got yesterday......I am paying for my picky clothing raising!

Time, slow down please!

This post is mainly going to be me thinking out loud, so if you don't want to read about this Mommy's emotions scroll down to the precious picture and call it a day on my blog.

I have been completely taken off guard by how strong my emotions have hit me this morning! I truly believe with all of my heart that Brooke going to full time Pre-K here in New Home is what she needs and wants and that she will fully thrive, but I think I have always thought all along that I would have her to myself until at least age FIVE! Two weeks from this morning my angel will start full time, 7-1/2 hour a day preschool. A lot of things are going through my head, mainly time slow down! She is growing up so fast, that my emotions haven't had a chance to catch up just yet. I truly love being home with her, teaching her, playing with her, etc full time, so I will miss her! I told her this yesterday and she hugged me and said "I know Momma, but I will be fine. My teacher will take good care of me, and I promise I will come home when school is over." How sweet is that.....that she has to comfort me!

I think a lot of what is going on in my head is that I expected to be 100% ready to go back to work full time in an office when she started school. But, now that she is starting in a mere two weeks I catch myself longing even more to be home when she gets out of school, to be here on sick days, to be here during any and all breaks from school, snow days, etc.....and I feel guilty about that part. My sweet Steven works two jobs day in and day out so I can stay home with our angel, and I don't WANT to go back to work?! Yep, that's me feeling completely guilty right now. I pray constantly about making the right decisions for our marriage and our family.....and even jokingly about a winning lottery ticket so we don't have to worry about bills, but realistically, I just want to feel at ease with our decisions, and since this part is still an unknown I feel a pit in my stomach.

Okay, okay.....I will stop. Instead I am off the computer to go enjoy my angel on this beautiful Monday, will keep praying about decisions our family will face, and will call my wonderful husband yet again to weepily tell him how much I appreciate him and all he does for our family. To make you smile, because it always makes me smile......our princess, wearing what else besides purple growing up WAY TOO FAST!!!

Aahhhh....

For what feels like the first time since we moved out here, Brooke and I have had a week of trying to plan nothing and just hang out! It is truly amazing how Brooke's temperament changed completely without company and a schedule to follow. I think this is the sort of 'vacation' we needed! Brooke and I have breakfast and lunch in our sunroom every day. I get to see the beautiful view of the cotton fields, watch the smile on her precious face and she gets to watch birds and play with her toys out there. So relaxing.

Brooke has had this chair for years now, courtesy of generous grandparents. She JUST discovered that it reclines because we've always had it sitting up against a wall. So, as I got out of the shower the other morning I found her watching cartoons like this.....does she look comfy or what?!

I love living out here. Love it! It is so peaceful, and just feels more homey (if that's a word) than I imagined it would. One of the many reasons I love being out here, is that Brooke is so much closer to where her Daddy does his after hours work.....the farm! Brooke has gotten to ride on tractors with her Daddy before, but now we can do it daily. It only takes about 3 minutes to get to the farm from our house now instead of 15.....so, we go to the garden regularly, and just show up to see what her Daddy is doing. Steven has also been able to be home every single night before she goes to bed. Something that was very hard to do when we lived further away. If I didn't like living out here the extra family time we are now getting would still be enough for me, but since I love it I consider it icing on the cake!

This picture just shows how out here Brooke is totally involved in anything her Daddy is into. I will share more pictures later, but here in our new small town people drive golf carts around instead of cars.....so, Steven found us a golf cart and here Steven, Uncle Bro and of course Brooke were checking it out.

Funny side note. We picked Brooke up from Vacation Bible School here in town the other night on the golf cart, talk about one thrilled little girl. She has also now been asking me if I can take her to school every morning on it.....my plan was to WALK.....but now I am sure we will be driving, HA!