Dear Daddy

Dear Daddy,

From the moment I was born I knew you would always take good care of me. You were right there, the first person I saw. You were by my side when they wheeled me down to the NICU. That first night, you barely left my side. Those 3 long weeks I was in the NICU, you held me every moment you could. You bathed me, fed me, changed me and loved me...all without hesitation. You were a natural. When you brought me home, you worried day and night about my health and well being. You searched high and low to make sure I had the best possible care. You spent almost 3 months at home with me...juggling work, coordinating my care with family members, never missing a dose of my very important medicine, taking me to doctors appointments...you were a rock! When it was time to go to school, only the best would do. I love our mornings we get to spend together. Waking up, to have you snuggle me, feed me, sing silly songs, do silly dances just to make me smile. I know it isn't easy, but you don't miss a beat. We have spent many, many nights cuddling in the chair when I was sick or just having trouble falling asleep. Everyone says I look just like you, we even tricked a few people with our baby pictures! I am proud to have you as my daddy and I look forward to celebrating many more Father's Days with you. I LOVE YOU!

Love & Laughter,

Your peanut-Ashlyn Mae

PS...Here is a little something I put together of you and me!  Hope you like it :)

Casper the friendly napper

Ashlyn was supposed to be taking a nap while she was home sick with Daddy.  He was watching her on the monitor and she was sitting up with her blanket over her head, waving her arms up & down.  I got this picture while I was at work!

Casper, the friendly napper!

Hope she behaves tomorrow

Two quick stories from school...

On Monday, I picked Ashlyn up and her teacher says, "I wish you would have been here 5 minutes ago.  Ashlyn just pulled Tommy down by the back of his shirt.  Tommy started crying and I told Ashlyn that wasn't nice and she leaned over and kissed him!"

Today I picked her up and she was sitting in Ms. Tomika's lap.  She is NEVER in her lap...always on the floor playing.  She said she was clingy today and didn't want to be put down.  Anytime Sailee would pull up on Ms. Tomika while she was sitting and holding her, Ashlyn would start crying and try to push Sailee away!

Someone is getting a little feisty!

Someone's in the kitchen with Dinah

Ashlyn's new favorite past time...cooking!  Well, maybe not cooking.  More like emptying everything out of her kitchen and banging things together.  She is loving it! 

Let's hear it for the boys!

I guess I shouldn't have told Ashlyn that the Mavs won last night.  She was so excited, she was up all night!  Or maybe it was that new tooth?  Anyway, we are very proud of our Dallas Mavericks.  Ashlyn was so proud, she wore her Mavs hat to school.

And to the bank and the grocery store after school!  We got stopped no less than 10 times with high fives and "let's go mavs" and thumbs up.  She was a hit!

But it is really exhausting being a MFFL!

We are hoping we can play hooky on Thursday and make it to the parade...shhh!!!

MFFL

We are a houseful of Mavs Fans!  Watching Game 6, getting Rowdy, Loud & Proud!

Doing the JET!

Sunday Funday (and a little work)

We have been busy trying to get the house ready to put it on the market.  We are pretty much finished with everything but there has been one daunting task that we have been putting off for months...maybe years!  Cleaning out the garage!!  Our garage is detached and we have never used it to park our cars in.  It has pretty much been storage.  We got up early this morning before it got too hot and started cleaning.  We took turns with Ashlyn and hustled during her naps to get it all organized and cleaned.  We are 95% finished and it looks so much better.  And you can actually walk around in there.  Ashlyn spent some time staying cool while we were outside by splashing around in her pool.  We also had a picnic and spent lots of time riding around in her car!  It was a nice day, outside.  Thank goodness for the breeze! 

 

Only Girls

Chance stayed home with Ashlyn so I could have a night out with my besties!  It was only fair since he got to go to game 5 and I had to stay home :(  He only got one ticket.  Anyway, had a wonderful night out with Em & Kourt and got to spend a little time with Ted.  We had a blast...as always!

Soaking up the sun!

It is so hot outside already!  I try and spend a little time each evening outside with Ashlyn when we get home from work/school.  It is too hot to go for a walk until closer to bedtime so we decided to splash around a little tonite.  Then I decided...why not just take a bath outside?  The old kill 2 birds method!  She didn't seem to mind a bit.

A fun weekend (with no photographer)

We had a great weekend, jammed packed with lots of fun!  We spent Friday evening at the grocery store :) Our new favorite Friday night activity.  We grab a glass (or bottle) of wine and wander around Whole Foods, find somethings for dinner and then eat dinner on their patio.  It is very relaxing!  Saturday morning, Ashlyn and I had brunch with Mimi and Great Grandma Sally.  We ate on her patio and enjoyed being outside before it got too warm!  Ashlyn took the longest nap of her life!  TWO and A HALF HOURS!  I couldn't believe it.  I kept checking on her!  We headed over to the Estes' for the annual "fish fry" even though there was no fried fish this year...it was blackened and grilled and delicious!  It was a lot of fun to see everyone and the kids had fun playing together.  Hopefully someone captured some pics!  We spent the night at Gpa and Gma's house Saturday night.  Sunday morning we got up and had breakfast and celebrated Gma's birthday!  We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing and swimming!  Ashlyn really enjoyed the water and I actually put her under the water for the first time.  She kind of sputtered and gasped when I pulled up her and then went back to playing.  She wasn't really phased.  The 2nd time she coughed and sneezed and I actually saw water shoot out of her nose.  I felt pretty bad but she didn't seem to mind.  She burped a few minutes later so I guess she swallowed a little!  We headed home after a quick dip after her afternoon nap.  Gma and Aunt Sarah came over to babysit Ashlyn so Chance and I could go to the Mav's game.  We won't talk about the results, but we had a good time!  Sorry there are no photos to go along with this post!  It was a great weekend.