Tucker turns 4!

Last weekend the girls went to their friend, Tucker's, 4th birthday party....

Cuteness....

They always get a front & center spot when it's cupcake time :)

and they sure did enjoy their cupcakes & icecream!

Lily Katherine = Preciousness

Meet Lily Katherine Spivey!!! Morgan delivered her two weeks ago tomorrow and she is just too precious! Look at that hair!! I only got to see her from a distance the day she was born (our family had the flu and I didn't want to infect anyone. Matt snapped this pic of her for me so at least I could feel like I got close to her :)

One week later after we all were done with the horrible sickness, I stopped by and visited little Miss Lily for the first time...too cute!!

Baby and momma are doing so great! Yay!

Twirling!

Missy, the feature twirler for USA, came over to hang out and give the girls their first ever twirling lesson! They LOOOOOVE them some Missy!

Jocie doing some sort of backwards toss?? :)

They love twirling their batons....especially with music blaring in the background :)

Thanks so much Missy! Can't wait for lesson #2!

Mardi Gras!

The girls and I headed to downtown Mobile for the Mardi Gras Floral Parade. It's supposed to be the most kid-friendly of them all.

Anxiously waiting....

All the kiddos gettin' their best spots to catch some goodies...

John and his adorable youngest son, Blake....

"When is EVER gonna start MOOOOOOM???"

Here they come!

Taking an inventory of all their booty :) And, yes, they caught a stuffed panda bear....really???

They ate 3 moon pies a piece....guess they were fans :)

Me and Ariel...

The Pilger fam...(thanks for inviting us!)

Babies having Babies!

Several weeks ago Jenna came to visit for a few days. Jenna and her hubby, David, and their adorable new little girl, Sidney are stationed in New Jersey where David is in the Coast Guard. I had a weird moment when Jenna first walked into the house holding her little baby girl. I led Jenna in a Bible Study group when she was here as a student at South (which totally seems like it was yesterday!). When I first had the girls Jenna would come over some days and help me with them. The first time she came to help with them I had to show her how to change a diaper b/c she had never changed one before. And now, a few short years later, she is walking into my house with her own baby and the girls were wanting to change her diaper. It was just one of those crazy moments. I mean, Jenna can't really have a baby yet....I mean, she is practically a baby herself, right?!? That would be a no. The truth is...I'm just gettin' old :)

Sweet Sidney!

Some of us girlies went out for Mexican to catch up with Jenna while she was here. It was SOOOO great to see you! Come back soon!

Silly, Silly Girls...

I mean....does this one really need an explanation?? "What mommy? We just make a willy big house!"

Two VERY different little girlies that sometimes do things almost identically :)

I let them dress themselves and this is what they came up with :)

While I went inside for about 5 minutes, Gabbie manages to find a spool of string/yarn stuff in the glove compartment of the van and proceeds "decorate the fence to make it butiful". I mean, why stop it at this point??

Joc REALLY wanted to be in the pic :)

She was SO proud of her work :)

The "choo-choo train" they made to ride in while they watch Veggie Tales. HILARIOUS.

My bohemian-tree-hugger-looking child & my totally-chic-I-am-a-teenager-child. Gigi took them to Target and let them each pick out an outfit. These are what they chose. Could they be ANY MORE DIFFERENT?!?

Gigantor Answered Prayer

Yea, I know....it's been a while again. It's like I blink and weeks have went by....geeeeez. Not to mention that life has continued to just be nuts with all kinds of unexpected circumstances coming into play....like the fact that during the first week of February I booked Shane an appointment for a massage. I had purchased him one off of Living Social back in October for his birthday but, of course, he didn't find time to redeem it until a few days before it expired. Well, when he got back from his massage, he walked into the house and had this really weird look on his face. I asked him how the massage was and he said that it was ok. Just ok??? I mean, it's not every day that he gets an hour long massage! He then proceeds to tell me that about minutes into the massage, the lady said that she felt a "mass of some sort" on his back in between his shoulder blade and his spine. She said that it definitely wasn't muscle and she recommended him going to the doctor asap to get it checked. WHAT???? Of course, he was completely freaked out (as was I...I just don't show it as much outwardly as he does). He went to a general practitioner the next day and he referred him to a general surgeon because he said it definitely needed to be removed and biopsied. The first appointment the general surgeon had open wasn't for another 2 weeks! Yea, we couldn't wait that long. Shane would go NUTS. I mean, dying of cancer is one of his greatest fears. We prayed that he would be able to get in sooner than two weeks. He called back a couple of days later and there had been a cancelation and he was able to get in the next day (PRAISE the LORD). The doctor examined the mass and concluded that Shane would need surgery to remove it because of the size and not knowing how deep it went. Surgery was scheduled for two days later. The surgeon came and spoke with me after the surgery and said, "Man! That was a tough one!! It was a whole lot deeper than I thought so I had to dig pretty deep under his scapula bone and the"n I hit two bleeders and blood started shooting all over the place! It was crazy".... "Ummmm, well, is he ok??"..."Oh, yea, he was out the whole time"....."ummm. ok. Yea, well I would hope so."....."Well, I'm almost positive that it is a benign tumor, but we will know for sure in a WEEK." Dang. A whole week?? That would feel like eternity. We were very thankful that he was able to get it all and that by the looks of it, he felt like it would be benign. We prayed, along with many others, that it would be. To our GREAT relief, a week later the doctor confirmed that it was in fact a benign tumor. THANK YOU LORD! I didn't realize how nervous I was about it until Shane called to tell me it was benign and I felt myself really breathe again for the first time in two weeks. It was definitely a gigantor answered prayer.

I know this is kind of a gross pic, but oh well :)

It took a couple of weeks for him to really feel like he could start doing some active things again. He is back in full swing now. Whew! What an unexpected couple of weeks. SO thankful that the Lord allowed the massage therapist to find it when she did and that it was benign.