Madison's 4 year well-check

Today was a big day in the world of Madison Reese.  It was her time to shine and show her doctor what a smart girl she is these days. 

Before we could get to the fun stuff, though, she got to hop on the big scale. 
She's 39 lbs, which puts her in the 75th%...

and 39 1/2 inches, which puts her in the 45th%. 
After that, she passed both the vision and hearing tests with flying colors...

and then we went back into the room to have her blood pressure taken.  It was 86/58 and her doctor declared it perfect.  After all of that was out of the way, she got to show off some of her skills.  She counted to about 45 and just stopped because she got tired of it, I think.  She sang her ABC's, spelled her name, got all of her colors right, identified shapes and letters correctly, and drew a circle, x, and square.  Her doctor didn't ask for her address, but she knows that as well.  Maddie's pedi was very impressed and said that she is performing at the level of a 5 year old.  Way to go, Maddie!  The only drawback to the visit was the three yucky shots that she had to get in her legs.  There's just no fun about that at all.  She cried some big alligator tears, but calmed down really quickly after it was all over.  I thought she definitely deserved a treat and told her to pick where she wanted to go.  Yogurtville was the big winner, so we headed home to get the other kids and off we went.

It was a hit!  Madison got her favorite--chocolate yogurt with sprinkles, gummy worms and mini-reese's peanut butter cups.  Doesn't that just sound delish?! 

Madison's favorite things:
Princesses
Make-up
Having her hair braided
Jumping on the trampoline
Going to gym class every week
Going to school--she loves her teacher and has two best friends in class, Madeline and Bryn
Going to Chuck E Cheese or McDonald's with Memaw after BSF
Doodlebugs--collects them on a very regular basis!
Cereal or pancakes with chocolate milk for breakfast
PB&J for lunch
Apples, bananas and strawberries
Corn on the cob, broccoli with ranch dressing, and green beans
Goldfish and cheese its win in the snack category
Movies!!  She loves movies so much and can recite a lot of them verbatim!
Power Rangers
Barbies
Chocolate ice cream and chocolate cake
Lady Antebellum
Singing--the girl sings a vast majority of the day.  There must be songs just going in her head all of the time.
She can dress herself now, making things much easier. 
She still is a great sleeper, going to bed around 8:15 at night and waking up around 7:30am
No naps anymore
Lila Lou--she is so good with Lila.  They play babies together all the time and get along so well.

I could probably go on for much longer, but I think I'll stop there.  Madison is a remarkable little girl.  She lights up the world, that's for sure!

Take me out to the ballgame

Friday afternoon around 4:00 I got an intriguing call from my dad.  "Hey Crystal, do you think Jackson would like to go to the Ranger game tonight?"

I already knew the answer to that, but I went ahead and asked anyway.  His response?  "Umm, yeah!!!"  By 4:30 they were headed to the Ballpark in Arlington.  This kid so lives the life of Reilly.

Since it was so last minute, they got seats in the outfield.  They got an unexpected bonus, though, when their section ended up right next to the bullpen.  "Hey there, Mike Napoli!"

They watched Matt Harrison warm-up and said he never really had the magic that night.  They ended up getting behind 4 - 0 in the first inning and never really recovered. 

Oh well--Jackson did get to see one of his favorites up close a time or two, and he was stoked when they found a Hamilton shirt that was his size in the pro shop.  I'm sure he will wear it at least 3 times this week:)

They had a good view of the game and almost were lucky enough to catch Hamilton's homerun to center field.  My dad said that it was right in line with them, just a few rows in front.  C'mon, Hamilton, don't you know that one of the biggest Ranger fans ever was in row 9, not 2?!

Good thing that Gigi was able to find some cotton candy.  I'm sure it kept a smile on this kid's face all night.  The Rangers made a good run of it and Elvis Andrus came really close to hitting a grand slam at the end that would have tied the game 8 - 8. 
It went foul, though, and we lost to the Tampa Bay Rays 8 - 4. 

The next morning, we continued on with the baseball theme.  The Cubs came to play!  Unlike the Rangers, they didn't allow any runs the first inning and played great defense all game.  This picture cracks me up because J could not look any less enthused, which couldn't be further from the truth.

He played great and made a handful of outs as our first baseman.

The Cubs won again!  That makes 7 in a row with no losses yet. 
Even better than the Rangers.  Now that's saying something...
Could we make a run for the little league pennant this year?  Stay tuned.

Blood, sweat and a few tears

When you're a serious ballplayer, that's just how things go sometimes.

Jackson's 6th game on Monday night turned out to be pretty eventful.  It started off great, with him getting a triple and then a double off of the coach pitch.  Then came the 3rd inning.  My man was playing 1st base and the sun was right in his eyes.  The ball was hit to the pitcher.  The pitcher fielded the ball and made the throw to 1st.  J man just didn't see it coming and didn't get his glove up in time.  The ball smashed his nose pretty hard and he immediately turned around with his head down.  His daddy was coaching near him, so he ran over to check him out.  When he turned around towards the rest of us, all we could see was blood flowing from his nose.  Poor little guy.  He had to come out of the game and we got his nose under control. 

His team got the next out pretty quickly and so it was their turn to bat again.  Who was #3 in the lineup?  You guessed it.  The ump came over and said, "It's got to be completely stopped bleeding before he can play."  I felt like we had a fighter and were about to put him back in the ring!  He wiped away the last few tears and assured us that he was alright.  Then he stepped up to the plate and got another base hit.  Yay!!

After the Cubs scored another 5 runs it was time to go back to the field.  Jackson went right back out to 1st base and then proceeded to make the next 3 outs.  He caught two throws from the pitcher and even caught a pop fly that was hit his way.  We were so proud of him.

All of that effort got J his second gameball of the season!  He was really excited.  The kid's not a quitter, that's for sure.  And he loves him some baseball, no matter if there is a little blood and tears sometimes. 

Date with Peyton--family style

Peyton and her family came over for lunch today.  Jackson was just a wee bit excited.  He started asking when they were going to be here at 9:00 this morning.  I told him that they would be here at 11 and then every 15 minutes or so after that we had to do the countdown.  It made for a very good math lesson:)

Around 10:55 this is where he could be found.  Front window, looking for her car!

Peyton's mom very nicely picked up Chick-fil-A for all of us.  The two young lovebirds insisted on sitting beside each other while they dined on their chicken nuggets.

After lunch was over, it was time to go hang out on the trampoline.  They were so sweet about taking turns with Lila.  How cute are they?!

When they were finished on the tramp, they went to check out the clubhouse and swing a little bit, too.  Lila Lou loved swinging with Peyton and her little sister, Presley.  I think she definitely gave her big brother a big thumbs up for picking such a sweet girlfriend.  Way to go, J man!

We've got static, yes we do!

Ha!  Isn't this great?!

A new 'do jumping on the tramp without a hairbow.

Seat drops, too! Wahoo!

Maddie Mae turned 4 on Tuesday!

After much anticipation, Madison Reese officially turned 4 this week.

She woke up bright-eyed and ready to wear her birthday princess crown.

Lila wished her Happy Birthday and they both giggled at their coordinating princess night gowns.

Then Maddie got a really giant hug from Lila, which started her day off oh so nice.

After J man woke up, it was time to enjoy a pancake breakfast.  There were smiles all around:)

A few hours later we were some of the only ones in Chuck E Cheese.  It was so nice!

The kids played all sorts of games and got lots of tickets playing skeeball.

Even though there are at least 55 different games to play, Madison's favorite may have been the "Ticket Cruncher."  I'm not sure if that is its real name or not, but that's what it does.  Gobbles up tickets and prints out a receipt with the total on it.  She loves it!

When Chuck E came out to sing, the kids couldn't resist and immediately rushed the stage.

The birthday girl was a little leery of this big mouse, but she eventually got close enough to have her picture taken with him.  Maybe she was just intimidated by his celebrity status.

We picked up lunch on our way to Gigi's and after stuffing our bellies it was time for the good stuff.  Barbie cake!

We had a fun family celebration, Madison blew out her 4 candles like a pro and then we ate some good chocolate cake.

Not sure what was the bigger hit--cake or these fairies.  She loved all of her presents and Jackson was an excellent gift-opening assistant.

I tried to get their picture together with this sweet card.  Jackson wrote "Maddie" on the front and was so excited to show her the Strawberry Shortcake card that he picked out for her.  They really do love each other, it's just hard to tell sometimes!  I love it when that love shines through, though.

We love you, Maddie Mae!  Hope you had a great day.

Bounce U

This year we decided to combine the girls' birthday parties and did one big one at Bounce U.  The kids were so excited about this--especially J and M. 

From the moment we walked in, they were rearing to go!

Lila welcomed our first guests to arrive...

and after most of their friends got there, it was time to go do some serious bouncing.

Maddie tackled the enormous blow up slide right away...

and true to form, Lila followed, as long I would do it with her!

After that big slide we went to hang out with the younger crowd. 

Memaw and Poppi got to stay for a little while before they had to go to a wedding.  Lila gave us one of her best smiles here...

unlike in this picture with Presley and Brooklynn!



Before we knew it, it was time to go into room #2.  Before we did that, though, we lined all of the kids for a group shot.  All but one got in the picture and they all looked so calm.  I'm pretty sure it was because they were exhausted from 45 minutes of extreme playing!



Inside room #2, we found this ginormous basketball goal.

J man must have shot at least 50 baskets.

Lila didn't do much bouncing without me holding her hand, but she did let loose for a second inside this quiet bounce house.

Then we ran into her friend, Brooklynn.  I love this picture of them.  I grew up with Brooklynn's mommy and I hope that they will grow up to be good friends, too:)

Even though we had so many entertaining options, Lila's favorite thing of the day was probably getting to hold Baby Temple.  She loves her.  And Temple is so good natured about letting Lila hold her. 

Right after I gave Baby Temple back to her mommy, I turned around to find Spiderman.  He had successfully scaled three floors of this wacky apparatus and was very proud of himself.

Meanwhile, Maddie and her crew were having all kinds of fun in this contraption.

When our bouncing time was up, we all headed into the party room for some cake and presents.  The birthday girls fit so nicely in their birthday chair. 

We sang to Madison first and she did a great job of blowing out the candles on her Barbie cake.

Lila was next and she did really good, too.  She even jumped the gun a little bit and blew out the first candle before we were done singing!

After we all had stuffed ourselves with chocolate and white cake, Maddie got to open her presents.

Lila had kind of lost interest by that time and opted to play with Aunt Lyndsie instead.

They are two peas in a pod.  Lila just adores her.

After we came home, Jackson helped us out by opening all of Lila's gifts.  He was really stoked when he opened up this double slip and slide!  He was very quick to point out that it was really for him because it says it's for kids 5 and up.  I'd like to see him try to tell the girls that they're not old enough to do it.

Lila finally came back around to checking out her gifts whenever she saw this precious little baby doll.  She does love her some babies, that's for sure!

We all had a fantastic time celebrating the girls' birthdays.  Thank you so much to all of our friends and family who helped make it such a great day.  We love y'all!