Saturday, July 28, 2012

Dr. & Mrs. Allen Ryves Moore

So it’s finally official- we have a new Moore cousin! On July 7th, we celebrated Mary Chris becoming part of our crazy family. We had a wonderful weekend in Oxford with lots of family time, and I danced until I thought my feet might fall off. I’ll always have great memories of dancing with my cousins, and there may or may not have been some sprinkler and grocery cart sightings with William and Meredith. Welcome, Mary Chris, and we are so proud of both of you! Looking forward to passing my baton to MC for making sweet potatoes at holidays!

Sha, Ryves, William, MeredithCF6C2895 The happy coupleCF6C2936Uncle Rod, Mere, Aunt SharonCF6C2948 Ryves, Mary Chris’ parents and younger brother, PayneCF6C2972 CF6C3062 IMG_2191 PreciousIMG_2196 Wedding dayIMG_2222 wedding IMG_2240 IMG_2307Just the three of us…don’t get these kinds of pics often!IMG_2322 Amy, Bubba, MereIMG_2295 Mere and I finally chased down the newlyweds for a pic.IMG_2323 My twinkie cousinIMG_2325 William, Aunt Di, Ryves, MCIMG_2328

Hodge Podge

Please bear with me through this potpourri post- I can’t seem to gather enough brain power to put together a common theme. Enjoy my stream of consciousness!

Helen Grace loves to pretend, and playing doctor is one of her favorite games. Here she is doctoring on Spiffer’s baby doll and making her list.2012-07-05 09.20.51 2012-07-05 09.23.54

She loves picking baby tomatoes from Teddy’s garden, and she’ll pop them in her mouth right off the plant. She obviously didn’t get that trait from her mama! She’s showing her Mississippi roots.tomatoestomatoes2

This mama enjoyed a moms’ night out recently with my Hope moms’ group. Jen pointed out that we are about to celebrate our third anniversary together. I credit any sanity that I might have to this wonderful group of true friends.

Jennifer, me, Ashley, Amy, Emily, Doty, Jessica, Laurenmoms

I had this sweet sleeping beauty in my bed the other night. Btw, this has become her favorite dress, and she insists on wearing it whenever it’s clean. Don’t be surprised when you see it in the next picture below.sleeping beauty

Since I’ve been letting her bangs grow out, I have neglected her poor hair, so I brought her along with me to get a haircut this week. She wasn’t happy about it, but after she watched Miss Danielle cover my hair with purple paint, she loosened up and eventually agreed to sit on my lap. P1020788

After dance this week, we headed to Byhalia to enjoy lunch with Mere Mere and Bubba. We love having Meredith so close that we can see her often, and HG sure does love her Mere Mere. And HG insisted on wearing her tutu so that she could show them. :)bubba1 bubba2

She loves to tell you, step by step, how things should be done. It could be how to do a dance she’s making up, how to do an every day task, or like in the video below, how to make a work of art out of sand.

Helen Grace has started crossing her arms, which is hilarious because you can see her concentrating trying to figure out how to do it each time. She also has picked up my ‘Uggghhh’ grunt when she gets mad. Poor girl. It was one of those ‘ah ha’ moments for me…when you hear something from your child that resonates with you from within your own head. She also scrunches up her mouth when she’s being sassy at me. Again, a face that I instantly recognized. Still trying to capture that one on camera! I am hearing more of that annoyed “M-oooommm” whine lately. It just makes me laugh!

She told me the other day that Spiffer had no more boo boo on her arm because her magic kisses had healed them.

She was walking along a brick wall with Spiffer, and Spiffer started singing, “Here she comes, Miss America!” HG turned to her and said, quite emphatically, “No, Spiffer, I’m not Miss America, I’m IN America!”

Before we go into dance or some other social situation, she’s started telling me, “I’m gonna be somebody’s friend.”

She loves to weigh and measure herself and wants to hear that she’s bigger or taller. She’ll yell, “I growed! I growed!”

We’re starting to hear some sarcasm. We were discussing what kind of classes she wanted to take in the fall, and I told her I thought she’d like soccer. She responded, “Well, yeah!” Ok, little missy!

We walked into Newk’s one night, and she said, “Look, Mommy, no more stripes!” They had reupholstered the bench by the front door. Ummm, think we go there too often? Or John blames it on the OCD she inherited from me. I’m sticking with my story.

After she put on some chapstick recently, I told her she looked so pretty but then caught myself and added, “But you are perfect just the way you are- chapstick or not.” Since then, she’s been trying to repeat that sentiment and will tell me, “Mommy, I love you just the what you are.” Gotta love that sweet little girl!

The Dancing Queen

Dance class continues to be the highlight of our week. She just loves it and has lost any shy bone in her body. The pics below are from last week, and the video is from this week. This Friday, I couldn’t have asked for more. She tried every skill that Miss Whitney asked her to do and did it happily. I’m so proud of her and love watching her practice at home, or really anywhere she goes. “Heel, toe, heel, toe.”

dancing- july 20- 1 This is so typical of their dance class…HG trying to turn around to see what Ann Maxwell is doing.dancing- july 20- 2 Getting down!dancing- july 20- 3

I apologize this video montage is so long. I know grandparents will be the only ones to watch it, but I’m so proud of the progress she’s made that I couldn’t stop myself!

So proud of herself…and her Aurora and crown stamp!stamps

Rolling on the River

Suzanne and the kiddos wanted to explore downtown Memphis while they were here, so we obliged and headed to the river. Helen Grace fell asleep in the car as we passed the Redbirds Stadium (grrr), but I was convinced that I hadn’t come all this way to not enjoy Flying Fish! So she slept until our food arrived, spent a few minutes trying to decide if she was going to wake up or go back to sleep, and finally chose to wake up and play with her cousins. Whew! After a tasty lunch, we headed down to take a look at the barges and boats on the river, sweated our fannies off, and ran back to the Peabody to take refuge. The ducks in the fountain were a big hit, but we were a little bummed that the rooftop was closed. Nothing could put a damper on HG though, and she was as happy as a lark to be running around chasing her cousins- what great memories!

Zzzzzzzsleep Playing hide and go seek with Hayes and Grace AnnP1020813 P1020815 P1020823 IMG_2441 IMG_2443 IMG_2446 IMG_2454 IMG_2457 IMG_2458 IMG_2459 IMG_2464 “Playing” piano with GranddaddyIMG_2465 What a great end to a great day- chocolate!!IMG_2466

Beauty & the Beast

On Friday night, our cousin, Hayes, starred in Briarcrest’s production of Beauty & the Beast as a wolf.  Quite an agile and spirited wolf, I might add! Helen Grace was so excited about seeing Hayes as a wolf and, of course, Belle. She sat still and paid attention to the whole performance (almost an hour and a half), and she went running down to the stage afterward. While we waited on Hayes, HG and Hastings had a big time spinning and dancing under the spotlights UNTIL HG caught sight of Hayes in her wolf costume. Her face was painted, and it completely terrified Helen Grace. She literally jumped off the stage and into my arms. Her head stayed buried in my shoulder for the longest time, but once Hayes started taking the make up off, she started stealing peeks at her. FINALLY, she got comfortable again and was back to exploring the stage and props. Spiffer said it looks like I need to start getting ready to be a theatre mom- which is fine by me!

Hayes, we are so proud of you and look forward to enjoying many more performances over the years!

You think she’s excited?IMG_2417Hayes the wolf in black….and HG glued to Granddaddy.IMG_2421 IMG_2422Sweet cousins- Hayes, HG, Hastings, Grace AnnIMG_2436 IMG_2440

Friday, July 27, 2012

Here Comes the Cow

One night this week, HG and I met our friends, Amy and Mary Claire and Ginna and Sallie Key, at Chick-fil-A for a girls’ night out. We didn’t realize that it was Family Night, complete with Bingo, a balloon man, and {unfortunately} the cow mascot. When we saw him walking out, I think all of us moms were momentarily frozen, unsure of how the girls were going to react. I have to say that we had the complete spectrum- Sallie Key was excited and brave, Mary Claire was terrified and trembling, and Helen Grace vacillated between hiding under the table and trying to make MC feel better by repeating, “It’s just a man in there.” When push came to shove, Sallie Key was the only one that would go close to the cow, and after she got her hug, we kept shoo-ing the cow away from our general vicinity. The girls were really excited about their ladybug balloon bracelets and the to-go ice cream that rounded out the night!

Sallie Key, Mary Claire, Helen Grace- that’s a lot of names for three little girls!CFA 1 Ladybugs!CFA 2 CFA 3