Cora Beth turns 5!

Wow, can't believe 5 years have passed since this sweet girl was born.  My niece's birthday party was last weekend so we made the trip to Lexington and had a great time celebrating...

 

I would like to mention how upset with myself I STILL am for forgetting my camera at my mom's house before heading to the party.  I remembered to bring it with us on the trip, but between remembering gifts and ice cream, stuff for Deacon, etc. I forgot.the.dang.camera.

 

So these photos were taken with my phone/instagram.  And that's okay in a pinch.  I just really wish I'd had my camera.  It is what it is, though.  The important thing is that she (and we) had a good time at her party.

 [Pin the Lips on the Frog -- so cute!]

 

 [Argh, mateys.]

 



Four, already?!

I don't know how 4 years have passed already since our family gained a precious little girl named Cora Beth, but that is what we celebrated last weekend -- her 4th birthday.

So when your daughter is born in the dead of summer, you look for the coolest way possible to celebrate...which means POOL PARTY!

We celebrated at her Nonna's house in Lexington since they have a pool.  The party began at 6pm so the temps had cooled down considerably, and it was very overcast.  So overcast, in fact, that the sky dumped a fairly big thunderstorm on us before it was all said and done.  It's okay, though, because by that point, most everyone was out of the pool anyway, eating cake and watching the birthday girl open her presents.

It was a good time and she racked up, as usual...

Okay, so let me just pause here for a minute.  Cora Beth is now to the age where she can tell you what kind of party she would like to have to celebrate her birthday.  And bless their hearts, my brother & sister-in-law asked her what she wanted.  And then had to scramble to make it happen.  She wanted a "pink tool pool party".

Uuuhhhm, okay.

:: whispering ::  How are we gonna do THAT??

Okay, okay.  I've got it -- we'll have it at my mom's house, right?  Cuz she has a pool.  So there's that part done.  And, and...we can get her a new pink bathing suit, huh?  That can be the pink part.  So now...the tools.  Hmmm.  What if I just make a cake and we stick some plastic tools on the top?  How 'bout that?

Sounds good to me.

Oh, and then your awesome sister can find a cute little tool set to give her as a gift! She is the best aunt! :)

We love you, Cora Beth!  Happy 4th birthday to you!

Happy 3rd birthday, Cora Beth!

Hard to believe, but my sweet little niece (who I swear was just born yesterday) turned 3 years old a couple weeks ago!  Poor sweetheart has a hottest-month-of-the-year birthday so my brother & sister-in-law are always trying to think "cool" for her birthday parties.  :)

This year, they had a POOL PARTY!

I promise you it was close to 120 degrees that day but everyone was happy to get together and celebrate this precious girl's presence in our lives for 3 whole years.  We all gathered to sing "happy birthday" to Cora Beth before the cute-as-a-button cake melted into a blob from the heat...

[baby girl is sometimes shy so she's "hiding" behind her hands while we sing -- *whispers* that's so we don't see her :) ]

And then we hit the POOL!

Cora Beth's "Nonna" (my SIL's mom) has a pool and it was quite big enough to accomodate as many adults as wanted to come in and the kiddos, too.  Honestly, I don't know how everyone wasn't jumping into the pool, as hot as it was.  With their clothes on, if need be.

Or off.  That's how my nephew, Bear, rolls...

[pweshus wittle bebe -- ::muah::]

But that's just me.  To be sure, I was in that pool just as much as I could be.  :)

And of course, Deacon enjoyed himself -- and everyone enjoyed him, too.  Eddie & Donna had a couple of floaties that we put him in and he just had a ball floating around to everyone, mingling, socializing.

Then it was time for presents!

At every party, Cora Beth gets more & more into all the different aspects of the parties, including the presents.  It's fun to watch her interact and show how much she's grown from last year's party.

[Bear was catching some zzz's while sister opened her presents]

I wish we were closer so we could see my brother and his family more often but we take what we can get and cram as much time as we can into the weekends that we do get to visit.  Cora Beth is such a joy and we're so blessed to have her in our lives.  Happy birthday, Cora Beth!

happy 2nd birthday, cora beth!

My niece turned two last weekend -- another year FLOWN by -- and we had a blast celebrating this special milestone with her.

The party was an ice cream theme (gotta love those summer birthdays! :) and again, my sister-in-law had the cutest ice cream decorations.  The tablecloths had ice cream cones & sundaes on them and we ate yummy ice cream out of cute little bowls.  Even Cora Beth's shirt had an triple-decker ice cream cone on it!

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE ice cream?

The party was at the home of my brother & sister-in-law's in Thomasville and family & friends gathered to celebrate Cora Beth.  She did so well, entertaining us all with new tricks and such.  And she racked up on gifts, of course.  :)

Here are some of the sweet moments from that day in photos:

[candles in the ice cream -- love it!]

[look at this big girl -- she got the hang of it real fast!]

[Cora Beth and her -- ahem -- boyfriend, Dylan]

[fun times with Uncle Jeff]

[Priceless.  She didn't actually pose for this but how cute is she??]

For more photos from her party, click here.

weekend activities...

Look what's happening this weekend!

Not sure how 2 years has gone by already...we just celebrated her 1st birthday, it seems...

16 mos

I bet you thought my next post was going to be on Christmas, right?  Wrong!  That's how behind I am.  <sigh>  No, I DO have Christmas photos to post, but I wanted to just post a couple I took of little miss Cora Beth at Thanksgiving this year.

I'm noticing a pattern.

Unless I say what holiday it is, you'd never know because the majority of photos I take now are of Cora Beth.  Just her.  Doing whatever she's doing.  But I just can't help it.  She's so darn cute.  And especially NOW...

Do you not LOVE her little glasses??  She got those 3 days before Thanksgiving so they were REALLY new when we got there.  But she never bothers them.  Never.  It's like they're not even there.  She has them in an effor to try to correct a bit of a lazy eye.  Hopefully that will do the trick.  Either way, she's just as CUTE as she can be!

cora beth's first time at the beach: day 2

Here are photos from our 2nd day at the beach during my brother & his family's visit here last week. This time we got out to the beach about 3:30pm so we had a little more sunlight. Again, Cora Beth did great and was such a cutie! Her little bathing suit was just *too much* with her little hat! Daniel & Brandi brought her little swimming pool out and we blew it up and filled it with water for her so she play in it. She loved just getting in and getting out, getting in and getting out, getting all kinds of sand in it. It was so funny to watch her...

I had a hard time narrowing down which photos to post of her here -- some of these just came out so good...