Gungy

What is a Gungy you ask?  Or maybe you're thinking how on earth do I pronounce Gungy.  I actually just spent the last five minutes trying to figure out how to spell it, so I'm winging it.  

Anyway, this is our little Gungy -

 

Ella came up with the word Gungy.  I don't know, just one day she starting calling Maddie "Gungy" and the nickname stuck.  I can't even remember when it started, maybe a year ago?  I do remember the first time Ella called her by that name.  Ella loves going to get Maddie when she wakes up from her nap.  She gets really excited and starts jumping up and down when I tell her that Maddie is awake.  One day after I told her Maddie was up, she said, "Hey, let's go get Gungy."  Not really sure if Maddie is going to appreciate that name when she gets older.  Well, she can thank her big sister for that one.  

We're big into nicknames around here right now.  Ella has recently started referring to Chris and myself as Daddy-Tron and Mommy-Tron and of course, Maddie is Gungy-Tron.  Nothing like adding a "tron" onto the back of your name to make you feel special or to make you feel like you should be in the next Transformers movie.  It's pretty catchy because we now sometimes refer to the girls as "The trons."  

Anyway, lots going on with us.  We're in the process of picking a realtor to help us sell this place so we can move.  Yay!!  We've spent the last week cleaning, and donating, and taking things to storage, throwing things away, and cleaning, and cleaning, and cleaning.  We have a lot more to do but we've definitely taken some big steps this past week.  

Ella's last day of preschool is next Tuesday. She is ready for summer break.  Not so sure that I am!  

Yes, she can throw

It was suppose to rain here all weekend so on Friday night after a great dinner, we decided we should take the girls to the playground since they were going to be cooped up in the house all weekend.  It was a beautiful night so we had the windows down in the car.  The girls love the wind in their faces and laugh hysterically- almost to the point where we want to roll the windows back up.

We pull up at the playground and the girls have their shoes and socks off.  They always takes their shoes off once we buckle them into their carseats.  Chris is looking all around and can't find one of Maddie's socks.  He asked Maddie where her other sock was.  She didn't answer right away and sat there looking at him.  Then she said, "I throw.....................I throw sock.....................Window."  She threw her sock out the window.  I'm glad it was her sock and not her shoe!

I guess we learned our lesson about having the windows open in the backseat.  We're going to have to watch this one!!

But there is no doubt she's my daughter.  The girl loves cake, just like her momma!  I made strawberry shortcake last night for dinner and she ate all of hers.  She then looked over to see what Ella had left in her bowl, pointed at it and said,  "Eat Ella's."  I am beyond amazed at how skinny she is.  

Mom's Night

A couple of weeks ago, it was my turn to go with Ella to school for Mom's Night.  Like Chris, I too was looking forward to spending some one on one time with Ella.  It's hard when you have two little ones running around to give them each some special attention.  So, I was really looking forward to our night.

We first went to one of Ella's favorite dining spots, Chick-A-Lay.  That's always a crowd pleaser at our house.  If Ella was picking where we would eat,  it would either be the Chick or the fish restaurant (that's Six Feet Under for those of you familiar with it in Atlanta).  

After finishing up our chicken nuggets and lemonade, we headed on over to the school.  We had a really fun night.  We went to her music class and sang some songs and then headed back to her class and painted a butterfly.  Ella loves to paint.  She brings home a painting every day from school.  Her teachers  told me that she loves to paint and do puzzles.  They also were telling me how much Ella has really come out of her shell the past couple of months.  It's so funny that she brought that up because Chris and I have really noticed a difference in Ella this past month or so as well.  All of a sudden, she's become this chatty little girl.  I mean she's always been very comfortable around the people she knows but now she's starting to be a little more friendly to everyone.  She'll say hi to just about anyone.  It's really been a great thing to see her personality really start to bloom.  

Back to school night,  her teachers did the same thing that they had done for Father's night and asked all the kids questions about their moms.  Here are Ella's answers to the questions.

1.  What is your mom's favorite color?

Ella's answer:  Pink

2.  What is your mom's favorite food?

Ella's answer:  Sandwiches

3.  What game do you like to play with your mom?

Ella's answer:  Jumping Jacks

4.  Why do you love your mommy?

Ella's answer:  I love my mommy because I love her

5.  What is your mommy's job?

Ella's answer: Doing the laundry

That last answer cracked me up!   We do a lot of laundry around here and Ella and Maddie are always my helpers.  

Yes, I can be creative

Okay, so I know Easter was almost a month ago but I had to write about this.  I came up with this idea all by myself and I'm proud of it!  As I was taking Cooper for a walk on Easter Eve, I saw some kids' sidewalk drawings up at the park and that's when I had my a-ha moment!  I was going to write the girls a message from the Easter Bunny so they would see in the morning that he had paid them a visit.  Brilliant!

I think it's a great idea!  Without-a-doubt, it's going to be a new Pearson family tradition.

I also left a little stuffed animal and an egg filled with candy out by the Easter Bunny's message.  Those stuffed animals were suppose to go in their Easter baskets last year!  It's amazing how forgetful you become once you are a mom.  That's a whole other post all by itself!

Finally, what do you think about Ella's jammies?  The warm temperatures popped up out of nowhere this year.  We were wearing winter coats one day and then out of nowhere we needed shorts!  I was completely unprepared for it and had no summer jammies for Ella.  Yes, I could have had her wear winter pjs but the kid turns into an inferno at night.  So, I tried to sell this T-shirt as a nightgown. Believe me, it was a hard sell.  Since Ella is such a creature of habit, she couldn't possibly imagine having jammies without pants.  She finally caved in but this was the last time she wore it to bed.  We went out the next week to buy some short jammies.  

Yay policeman!

This blog post is WAY overdue! This event happened almost 3 weeks ago! I'm the worst blogger ever. Sorry for the delay all you faithful readers.

So, about three weeks ago, I experienced one of the scariest moments to date as a mom. Looking back, it seems kind of silly to have had the reaction that I did. But as the everything was unfolding before me, I did indeed freak out a bit. Ella was on Spring Break that particular week and I wanted us to do something fun and memorable. Well, it was memorable alright, just not the way that I intended it to be!

We were down in Fayetteville since my aunt and uncle who were in town for the day. We went out to dinner. I drove the girls in my car and my parents and aunt and uncle drove in another car. After dinner, my dad helped me take the girls to the car and then left to take everyone else home. I finished buckling the girls in their carseats and shut the door. I went to open my door and it wouldn't open. I tried opening Maddie's door and it wouldn't opened. I tried to open the trunk and I am sure you can guess what I am about to say...yep, it did not open. I had locked my keys (and the the girls!) in the car.

My parents were just driving out of the parking lot, I was able to flag them down with my frantic arm waving. Not to mention the fact that I ran after them. They came back, my parents helped to calm me down and my mom called 911. A sheriff showed up within a couple of minutes. As he tried to unlock the car, my aunt and uncle entertained the girls. Thankfully, the girls had no idea what was going on. They just sat there smiling and waving like nothing was wrong. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity (it couldn't have been more than three or four minutes) the sheriff had the doors unlocked. The girls were fine, just a little sweaty. It also just happened to be 80 degrees that day.

I definitely learned my lesson and my keys will always stay with me. I have become almost neurotic about it now. I am grateful for my parents and aunt and uncle who were there to help calm me down and I will forever be grateful to that police officer.

As we were driving home, I explained to the girls that mommy had locked her keys in the car and that I was very sorry that they were stuck in the car. Ella said, "It's okay, Mommy." Maddie then went on to say "Yay, Mommy!" Ella chimed in and said, "No, Maddie, not Yay, Mommy. Yay, policeman!"

We did end Spring Break on a good note by going to the zoo. The girls would go here every day if I would let them. Good thing we have a season pass! If you asked them, Ella would tell you that her favorite animals to see at the zoo would be the giraffes, followed by the gorillas and Maddie's favorites are the monkeys with the "mingos" coming in at a close second.

Here are the girls checking out the "mingos".

And the train ride is always a favorite.

Happy Birthday, Chris!

Happy Birthday to the most amazing and wonderful man that I know - my husband!

I think one of the hardest parts about Chris being gone during the week for work, is that we miss out on a lot of special days as a family. And today is one of those days. It just doesn't feel right that he is away from his family on his special day. Birthdays were always a pretty big deal at my house growing up. My mom would always make our birthdays really special. Actually, she still does and I'm 33 years old! I hope I can do as good of a job at creating those birthday memories for my girls as my mom did for my brother and I. So, I guess that's why it's a little hard for me when we aren't all together on a special day.

At least Skype was there to help save the day and to help up all be together via the internet. The girls were able to talk to their daddy and sing Happy Birthday to him. Ella and I have been singing Happy Birthday for the past couple of days in the hopes that Maddie would pick it up. She did pretty well. She definitely had the "happy birthday" part down. I think they were just excited to see daddy on the computer.

Chris and the girls planted flowers around our one little tree this weekend. The girls had a blast! They even picked out the flowers. Can you guess which color Ella picked? Her favorite color, purple.

Happy Birthday, Chris! All of your girls love and miss you!

Easter bunnies

Let me just start off this Easter post by saying that I am SO happy that Easter is finally here and gone. Why? I seriously don't know if I could handle Ella asking me for the 300th time when Easter was going to get here. It was really cute at first and I thought it would wear off after a couple of days. Nope, that didn't happen. She would literally asked me at least 10 times a day if it was Easter yet. That is no exaggeration. From the time she got up until it was time to go to bed, she had Easter on the brain. She definitely amazes me.

We had Easter at our house this year. A first for us. We usually go down to Fayetteville and spend the day at my parents house. We decided to change things up this year and have my parents come up to our house. And Chris's brother, Erik, who is a freshman at Georgia Tech, was also able to spend the day with us. It was so nice getting to spend the day with our family.

Chris and Erik made an awesome team in the kitchen. It's kind of funny how both of them really like to cook. They made a great feast; peach bellinis, lamb, orzo salad, a green salad, and yummy swiss chard. To steal a line from Maddie's favorite TV show at the moment, Yo! Gabba Gabba, there was definitely a party in our tummies! Thanks for the feast, boys!

This picture was taken two days before Easter. I was only able to get this shot before Maddie took the Santa hat off. We thought it was hilarious. Ella with the bunny ears and Maddie chanting "ho, ho, ho."

All of these pictures were taken the day before Easter at the egg hun in our neighborhood. The girls are now egg hunting pros after going to this egg hunt and one the previous weekend. Maddie is an egg hunting machine. She was focused and on a mission; to get as many eggs as possible.

Hope everyone had a great Easter!