Catch Up!

Ryan and I were talking last night and we want to make more of an effort to document our day to day activities with Ashley and Peyton. Life goes by so fast and we don't want to forget all the little things we do as a family. As minute and mundane our daily lives may seem sometimes, each day makes up the bigger whole and so much happens each day. I don't want to look back five years from now and regret not jotting it all down. I wish I could back to when Ashley was two years old and just remember the little things she did. So here go my daily blog posts. This one will be a bit longer since I have not posted in over a year.

Peyton will be two years old in exactly two weeks and Ashley will be five years old in a week a a half. Ashley did not have a birthday party when she turned three because her baby brother was born 4 days later (and we did not know when he was going to make his arrival!). Last year I was somewhat lazy and just combined their birthdays. I stressed and stressed about it and in my mind, it was a bit of a disaster. Unorganized, not enough for the kiddos to do, the food took forever to make, etc. So this year I wanted to do something special for Ashley, for her to have her own little party with her friends.

I chose to have her party at First Health Fitness Center. I invited everyone in her class and some of her other friends. It was so much fun and she has so many friends come! I was overwhelmed that she had so many of her classmates and friends to celebrate with. This has been a very tough year for her and Ryan and me, not knowing if there is something "off" with her. Going to see a neurologist, psychologist, physical and occupational therapists, etc. I know she can be a bit "different" sometimes and can be a bit of a loner at school. I was worried no one would come to her party because of the issues we have had. I was so wrong! There were almost 30 kids there and I don't think I will ever forget the huge smile on her face when everyone sang "happy birthday" to her and she blew out the candles. It was priceless. She was eating her pizza and she told me (well, shouted to me!), "Mommy, I love my birthday party, thank you!". Then when she was eating her strawberry cupcakes (her special request), she said "Thank you for making these cupcakes Mommy!". She is such a sweet, joyful girl with such a loving heart that is sometimes forgotten when she is driving me crazy by not listening. It is in those moments that everything is okay and all the trouble/stress/money of the past year is so worth it because I know she is going to be just fine.

After her party, we had a somewhat low key weekend. We went to a birthday party on Saturday, had a low key Saturday night, went to church, the pool and Sammy and Melissa's house on Sunday. Ashley has vacation bible school this week at Grace Church so it is busy! I had a long morning with just Peyton today. I love my time with just Peyton! He is the sweetest, cutest, smartest little boy I know. He is so loving, his favorite thing to do is sit on my lap and read books. He will tuck his legs in my legs and just sit back and read read read!! I will sometimes stroke his arm or give him kisses and my heart is so full. I am so grateful I will still have two mornings alone with him once preschool starts back up again in the fall.

That is our week so far! I will try to be be better about this, just gotta figure out how to get pictures on here faster than taking them on my camera and downloading them. I may have to check out instagram.