Put me in Coach, I'm Ready to Play

Hadley played tee ball for the first time this spring.  Some weeks we had three games in a week; talk about keeping you busy.  We had plenty of family tee ball games in our front yard, trying to get Hadley used to running bases and going to get the ball and throwing it back to the pitcher.  

Hadley's best buddy, Aubree, was on her team which we loved.  It was so fun cheering our girls on.  Aubree's dad was the head coach and Justin helped out at each game and practice as well.  He enjoyed that special time with Hadley.  Seems he can't get away from coaching.

One of Justin's ball players let Hadley borrow her softball helmet from when she was younger, but it was still pretty big on Hadley's head.  So she would run the bases while holding on to her helmet for dear life.

Hadley did a great job hitting the ball off the tee this season.  She cracked us up because her favorite part of the games continued to be the dugout.  She said the kids played games in there while they were waiting their turn to bat.  Our little benchwarmer ;)

The last game of the season was when the kids were presented with their medals.  You would have thought it was an Olympic gold medal.  She wore it everywhere for the next few days.

Granna and Grandad were there to support Hadley every step of the way, as they always are.  We loved getting to encourage Hadley with her newest endeavor this spring.  We saw great growth from her this season and can't wait to see what she decides to do from here.  Go Royals!

Spring Break Projects

When Spring rolls around, I always dream up house projects.  House projects usually involve dollar signs, but a couple of recent projects were very inexpensive.  Last summer, I painted our wooden garage doors this chocolate brown color.   But I still wanted to give the doors a little more of a custom look.  So I turned to everyone's source of decorating ideas, Pinterest.

First, I used one inch painter's tape to tape off each top panel.

Then I took a small can of black paint and painted over the entire thing.  Wondering where I'm going with this yet?  Are you slightly scared?

After adding carriage door hardware from Lowe's and removing the painter's tape, this was the final result.  I have to say that I was pleased with the update.  We've even had people ask if got new garage doors.  

Next, I turned my attention to the master bathroom.  This was one area of the house that had not been updated when we purchased it.  I searched pinterest high and low until I found something I liked.  I decided that one easy upgrade would be to have someone build a cabinet in between the two sinks and then give it a more custom look with some nice, new crown molding.

The stark white-ness of the cabinets and countertop were also a little much for my liking.  Somehow or another I happened upon a product called giani granite.  It's a total do it yourself granite paint kit.  That's right, I painted my bathroom countertop to give it a granite look.  I have actually had this granite kit for a long time but I couldn't get the nerve up to actually try it. I mean, if I messed this up it would be a colossal nightmare.  But I finally decided to bite the bullet and try it.  It was now or never.

Turns out, I was super pleased with the results.  I know that I at least fooled a five year old.  When it was all said and done, Hadley walked in to our bathroom and said, "Hey, this matches our kitchen."  Our kitchen is real granite, too, I might add.  It was actually a lot of fun, too; kind of therapeutic almost.

The paint kit only cost $19.99.  Not too bad for a cheap, quick update.  Now, on to the next project.  Justin is praying it doesn't involve dollar signs. ;)

Happy Easter

Hadley often asks me which is the most important holiday, Christmas or Easter?  I love getting to talk to her about celebrating the birth of Christ and then celebrating his resurrection.  There is a popular christian song right now that she loves to sing the chorus to.  

We believe in God the Father

We believe in Jesus Christ

We believe in the Holy Spirit

And he's given us new life

We believe in the crucifixion

We believe that He conquered death

We believe in the resurrection

And He's comin' back again, we believe

Yes, we certainly do believe and that's why we celebrate Easter.  I loved the kids in their shades of baby blue this year.  This was Canaan's last time to don knee socks (sniff, sniff) and I'm really struggling with that.  He's my baby y'all.  The kids loved finding their baskets of goodies left by the Easter bunny.  Hadley got the collection of American Girl DVD's and she is in love with Felicity.  I watched Kit Kittredge with my students at school recently and fell in love with it.  I foresee family movie nights involving these DVD's very soon.

After a wonderful morning of worship, we headed to Auburn for lunch at Nana and Grandaddy's house.  We were blessed with a gorgeous Easter Sunday, so I took some pictures of the kids by the fish pond.

Canaan's fresh boo-boo was still hurting him but we tried to keep ointment on it when we could wrestle him down.

Cousins Amelia and Jack were in from Evansville and Hadley had so much fun feeding fish and playing paper dolls with Amelia.

No trip to Grandaddy's is complete without a ride on the golf cart.  Good thing we didn't have any more great-grandkids there at the time because there's no way they could have all fit on there.

Egg hunt number 3 proved to be just as exciting as the first two.  Hadley's tutu looked like it had eggs on it and one time Canaan tried to take one of the pom poms off of it.  He didn't understand why it wouldn't come off her skirt.

Later that afternoon, we headed to Gamaliel to Ma and Papa's house for, you guessed it, another egg hunt and meal.  Aunt Sheryl had placed lots of quarters in eggs so Hadley was thrilled to get money; a nice change from all the candy since this was egg hunt #4 after all.

Our kids headed home that evening quite a bit richer and all hyped up on sugar.  Although our Easter Sunday was busy and entailed lots of driving, being with our families and celebrating our risen Savior made all that worthwhile.  Happy Easter!

Pre-Easter Egg Hunts

The ridiculous amount of snow we had this winter has made everyone beyond ready and excited for Spring.  I have never been so ready to see green grass and leaves on trees. We are fortunate to have lots of egg hunts and family get-togethers to help celebrate the new season.  Our egg hunt at church was so windy that I thought we were all going to get blown away.  But it didn't seem to slow down the kids at all.

Canaan could have kept up with any of the big kids this year.  He was a man on a mission and racked up all kinds of candy.  I love egg hunts at church.  After rounding up all the kids into the fellowship hall and telling them which age groups would be hunting where, you could cut the excitement with a knife.  When the children's director yelled, "Go" it was a mad sprint to get as many eggs as possible.

The Saturday before Easter, Aunt Michelle hosted my dad's side of the family for an egg hunt and delicious barbecue lunch.  All my nieces and nephews got to come, which is always a ball.  

This family get-together was baby Lawson's first appearance with so many people.  Yes, grandbaby number 6 made his debut and is just perfect.  Levi is one proud big brother.

My sweet boy was running around in the yard and fell on a shrub that had been pruned very far back.  The injury was closer to his eye than I would have liked, but I'm thankful that it wasn't in his actual eye.  Ah, the joys of being a boy mom.

The patriarch of the White family; Jewell Truman White.  Grandaddy White can usually be found either at church or watching a sporting event of some kind on his television.  He's the father of five, a life-long tobacco farmer, avid fan of Nascar and Kentucky basketball, and lover of the Lord.  And he's the only man I know to say "Well, Thunder" when he's mad.  

We had a great time enjoying the beautiful Spring day and basking in the sunshine.   It's always special to get together with our large extended families.  Loving the newness of life that Spring brings and the newness of life that Christ brings as we celebrate Easter!