Jeff Holly

Friday, June 3, 2011

So my super sweet mother-in-law offered to keep Emma for a few hours and since Gracie is taking a nap, I figured, what the heck why not blog!! I know right, you are all thinking, it's about time!! But then comes my next thought, how do you start a post when you haven't blogged for hmmm….like a year?! Instead of trying to fill in the gaps I decided to just start.

We just went out to D.C. to see this girl,

my big sister Wendy graduate with her Master's Degree from George Washington University!! I know right, AMAZING is the only word to describe her. It was great to be there with her and my family and celebrate. It also happened to be over the period of time that Jeff had some training back there. We were there just over two weeks and loved every minute of it. Especially because it was officially summer back there, which means we spent a lot of our time outside soaking up the sun.

This next week is super busy for us. First up this little girl,

will be going in on Tuesday for eye surgery. Hopefully everything goes well and when she comes out she will look at things with both eyes!! Also walking in and seeing her like this...

I figured not only A) I shouldn't leave the luggage cart unattneded, but also that B) I should probably start her back up in gymnastics. We did a Mommy and Me in Dallas, but I decided that was super crazy and now with Gracie impossible. So I wanted to wait till she could go on her own. So next week she starts that and I think, judging by the pictures she will LOVE it! Also we are getting a fence put in (insert angels singing) finally! This means I will have a place to contain my wild and crazy girls for the summer and also happens to take place next week. So, maybe I shouldn't promise another blog post in the next week………Ending on a funny note when we went to the mall in D.C. Emma didn't want to step foot in this elevator….

Anyone want to guess why?! I know, you are all thinking that it looks normal right? But a 3 year old's mind obviously thinks differently. To her this was an "ambulance elevator and I'm not hurt so I don't want to ride in it!" I had no clue what she was talking about. Ambulances do not have elevators and even if they did she wouldn't know what they looked like. She then pointed at the sticker to the right of the giant green 3. I'm sure she had seen that symbol on an ambulance and when she saw it on the elevator figured that meant it was a "ambulance elevator." It's crazy what kids remember right?! Just the other day when we were in the taxi she pointed to the mirrored imaged Ford logo on the window and said that was the car we were in, ok so your thinking meh any 3 year old can remember Ford being a car brand right? She then proceeded to tell me that it was an American Idol car. It makes my brain hurt thinking of all the things her brain is trying store. I can't help but love her!

Thursday, September 9, 2010

update

Ok, so we have until tomorrow at 2 pm EST to vote, so the contest will be open until then!

I'm a bad blogger, but how about a giveaway?!

So, I always feel like it would take FOREVER to blog about everything that has been going on so I just never do it. I have sooo many pictures and thoughts to put down and someday I will. But this blog post is dedicated to my sister Wendy. She has worked really hard to get to where she is at and had done some amazing things for the Dept. of Education in DC. She is going back to school right now and is getting her Masters in Education at George Washington University. I am super proud of her! She just recently entered her essay into a contest for a scholarship and since she has paid for all of her education herself this could really help her out. Her essay made it to the top 25 and all she need now is votes, so please please please vote for her. You have to sign up here and become a member, seriously guys it takes like 10 seconds. It says you have to be a government employee to sign up but she emailed the guy in charge and he said you didn't. So you just put the info in the boxes with the stars an when you get to the box that asks the agency or organization you belong to you can put anything. After you sign up go here and reply to the post voting for #12. Because I really want her to win I'm doing a giveaway for some of my favorite fabrics. You get a fat quarter of each of these two amazing prints and all you have to do is vote for my sister and you get an entry! How cool is that?! So just come back here after you have voted and leave a comment saying you voted. Oh yes, the contest will end tomorrow at 2 pm EST, thats when the voting for her essay ends as well. So hurry on over and cast your vote!

Okay and if you have made it this far here is a sneek peek of some of our adventures we have had in the last 6 months.

Virginia beach was amazing!

Emma LOVES the metro even though she wouldn't smile for the camera. Its harder to get her to smile in pictures than Gracie!

This was just Gracie smiling...I couldn't resist.

and lastly a picture of Ems running on the Boardwalk

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

I guess its about time.....

Wow!! It has been a loooong time since I've blogged. There has been a lot of things going on and I feel like I've had zero time to do anything! My #1 reason for taking such a long break is potty training. No one ever told me how frustrating and time consuming this process would be. Its been awhile and I feel like I've gotten no where. Any ideas would be much appreciated.

Life has been pretty hectic lately. Jeff was gone in Arizona for a month and a half and came home a few days before Christmas. We moved into our new house 3 days before my sister Wendy came to visit and help out before my family came for Christmas. We had an awesome time, ate way too much food and stayed up late playing games and watching movies. We successfully got my kitchen painted an awesome shade of turquoise and painted the bottom half of Emma's room a sort of raspberry sorbet color with white chair rail half way up. (pictures to come soon) Thanks fam for all of your help!! It was nice to be able to have everyone together for the holidays. Even if it did mean that all my siblings had to sleep in sleeping bags on our living room floor. Thanks guys for putting up with our lack of sleeping quarters. My Mom graciously stayed around to help out with the baby prep and life after the baby came, which was GREATLY needed. Thanks Mom!!!

After waiting 5 extra days, Gracie Marie finally decided to join our family. She was born last Wednesday the 13th at 6:51 weighing in at 7 pounds 2 ounces and measuring 19 inches long. I went in for my appt. and they decided that I should stay and they would break my water. Once they did that it was only about 3 hours before I had her. Call me crazy but I decided to have Gracie without meds as well. Everything worked out really well and I am recovering much better than last time. I am still getting used to only getting 2 hours of sleep at a time. With Emma we had to wake her up every 5 hours to feed, so its been hard trying to adjust. Other than that things are going well and we are happy to have Gracie Marie join us! Here are a few pictures of our little girl and a few with the extremely excited big sister.

Monday, September 14, 2009

Green Beans Go!!

As of lately I have been trying to teach Emma what the green and red traffic lights mean. When I was driving her home from Gymnastics on Thursday I kept hearing her say green beans. I had no clue what she was refering to and thought that maybe some of the trees leaves looked like green beans. Later that night when Jeff, Emma and I were driving to the store she said it again and I realized that she was refering to the traffic light. She thought I was teaching her to say "Green Beans Go" when the light turned green. She shortens it a little now and just yells GREEN BEANS, whenever we go through the light. The funny thing is she doesn't even like green beans. I can't help but laugh everytime we drive through a light. I thought about correcting her, but its too darn cute and I love hearing it!

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Shes All Grown Up!!

So sometimes I have these moments when I realize that my baby girl isn't really a baby anymore.

One of Emmas favorite songs is I Love to See the Temple, so we decided that we would take a special trip one night and show her the Dallas temple. We were able to talk to her about how special it is and also to point out the angel Moroni on top. Now there are A LOT of churches here with really elaborate steeples on top and Emma gets really confused about the difference between churches and temples.She thinks that there are lots of temples here. So we told her if the gold Angel Moroni isn't on top, then it is just a church. Well on Sunday Jeff picked up a pass-a-long card with a picture of the Salt Lake Temple on it and gave it to her. She looks at it and says "A Temple!!" "A House of God, Mom" and then pointed out the angel Moroni on top. It was amazing to me that the words of a simple primary song could point out so perfectly what the Temple truly is and that someone so small could recall such a phrase at the right time. Sometime I think that the things I teach her go right in one ear and out the other and that I am getting no where. But its times like this that make me want to continue to teach her and lead her in the right direction in this world. So I guess what I'm saying is never give up, always take the teaching moment and someday your kids will surprise you.

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Time to Celebrate!!

So Friday we were finally able to have the ultrasound to be able to see our baby and find out what we are having! It looks like we will be able to reuse ALL of the cute baby GIRL clothes we bought for Ems for our new little baby because we are having a GIRL!! Everytime we would ask Emma what she thought we were going to have she would always say GIRL! So I guess it came to no surprise to her. She is super excited to have a new sister and soo are we! Jeff is a little worried that his sports playing boy isn't going to come but I keep telling him it will. He plays really well with Emma and I know it will be the same with the new little girl.

We decided to SUPRISE, go to Olive Garden to celebrate, well I guess it was a little of two things we had to celebrate. Our four year anniversary was on Wednesday, yes the day we went to the ball game, funny, but we didn't get a chance to celebrate it during the week so we went to dinner on the weekend. I of course was hoping that Ems would take to the alfredo sauce, since its a family favorite and of course she LOVED it! She ate soo much I thought they were going to make us pay for an extra person! We finished it up with a black tie mousse cake, if you havn't had it, its amazing! It's like a chocolate and vanilla cheesecake, sooo yummy. Although this time we didn't get to eat as much. After eating all those noodles I thought for sure Emma wouldn't eat much of the cake, but I was wrong. She downed it!

Rangers Game!!!

So last Wednesday the Rangers were having their $1 hot dog night, of course we had to go! Emma LOVES hotdogs. Plus we got half price tickets. This was Emmas 3rd Major League Baseball game. Shes been to Camden Yards, the Nationals Park and now the Rangers ballpark. I have only been to one more park than she is and she is twenty years younger than I am!!
I really hate that it doesn't cool down at night here but at least we weren't in the sun the whole game. It was still really hot though, I think my feet were swollen to three times the size they normally are. Emma out ate us in hotdogs by eating two whole hotdogs! Sometimes she can eat like a grown man! Here are a few pictures.