A Girl Named Gracie

We are IN LOVE with a tiny little girl named Gracie Mae McDonald.  My beautiful sister, Megan, gave birth to this little peanut on Monday, May 24th.  Meg and Ian decided not to find out the gender of the baby so we couldn’t wait for the little one to arrive to find out if we were shopping for Pink or Blue.

The Dolar children are very excited to have a new little cousin and Ms. Emma Jane is over the moon that she is a girl!

I can’t describe the feelings that I have now that my sister is a Mother.  I’m so excited to be a part of this journey with her.  She is going to be a great Mom!!!

Gracie was born at 11:30am and is a mere 5lbs 2oz, 18.5 inches long.  She was born only a week earlier than her due date, she’ll probably be a petite girl!

Gracie has long fingers, a cute little nose and likes to stick her tongue out.  She is a calm, sweet soul and I want to be around her all the time.  She has amazing parents that love her dearly.

Here are a few pictures.

I’m sure I will get in trouble for this last picture of Megan.  That tattered yellow blank by her head is her baby blanket that she brought to the hospital with her.  She was sleeping for a bit after the epidural kicked in.

Road Trip

This past week, I was in Baltimore for work. Kelly and the kids were in Denver the same days I was gone. Our Niece Mareia graduated from High School in Denver and Kelly decided to take all 3 kids and drive to Colorado to be there for her big day.

I’ll admit it, I was a little worried about Kelly driving such a long distance with all 3 kids by himself but he did great! I just grabbed the camera out of the car and found the following pictures (just a small sampling). Bet you can’t guess who the “ham” is in our family?! At least the camera kept them entertained for a bit.

Happy Mothers Day

I love being a Mom.  It really is a tough job but I look into the eyes of my kids and it makes it all worth it.

I have been very blessed to have amazing Moms to look up to!   My entire life I’ve been surrounded by beautiful, hard-working, loving and caring  mothers.  I am also glad that my kids have these same women to look up to as they grow up.

A friend of mine posted the following on facebook today and I really think this sums it up perfectly:  Here’s to good women: may we know them, may we be them, may we raise them.

This is a picture of me with my awesome Grandma Ann, my amazingly wonderful Mom, Kate (Ann’s daughter) and my beautiful daughter Emma Jane.

Batter Up!

Its Spring!  Which means the weather changes on an hourly basis – sunny and 70 degrees and then an hour later its snowing.  It also means BASEBALL! 

I’m a proud Momma of two Outstanding Baseball players.  Mastin and Chase both play baseball with the Kearns Babe Ruth Baseball league.  This year Mastin is playing in the Majors and is on the Tampa Bay Rays, Chaser is in the Minors and is on the New York Yankees.

I’m also proud of my husband who volunteers his time as assistant coach on Chases team and is also on the Board of Directors for the League.  This is his second year on the Board and I’m so glad he takes this active roll in our boy’s sports as well as the community.

Here are some pictures from the first couple of games.  I’m sure there will be more later!!

 

Chase pulls these funny moves like the big leaguers when he is at bat (check out his left hand in the air).

 

    

Very, Very proud of Mastin – was able to Pitch the last inning of their last game.  Did a great job and assisted with a double play to get a runner out at Home.

A Seuss-Tastic Baby Shower

Yesterday, we hosted a Dr Seuss themed baby shower for my sister Megan at the home of our cousin (thanks Ali!!). Megan and Ian are expecting their first child in May.  Here are some pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

Your favorite Seuss characters to welcome you at the door. 

A centerpiece with pictures

Food!    

 

 

 

 

 

Cat in the Hat Parfaits and Thing 1 & Thing 2 cupcakes.  We also had Green Eggs and Ham Salad Sandwiches.

Jell-O Cups with Two Fish!  One Fish, Two Fish…

 This is a cake made out of Diapers!  Really easy and it turned out really cute.

The McBaby Belly.  Are you a Boy or Girl?!!  We need to know!!!

Megan and Baby DeLa.

 

Sisters!

 

 

 

Cute pregnant girls!  Meg and Traci are cousins, Traci’s baby is due in August.

It was a great day with family and friends!

Clean your room!

Our kids are slobs.  Really.  I’m not proud of this or ashamed to admit it at this point.  The bottom line is that they know how to get things out but they don’t know how to put things away.  Obviously, a trait I failed to teach them early in life.  We do a deep clean of bedrooms about every 6 months.  Its starting to get better as they get older, but its still frustrating.

The worst offender?  Emma Jane.  You would think the “girl” would be neat and tidy – not a chance.  I think she does better when no one can see her floor or dare step in her room.

The last two weeks have been especially frustrating for me, for some reason there has been more clutter in the house.  I decided that I wanted to take a day, just by myself and do a little spring cleaning so I scheduled a “vacation” day from work this last Monday.  Well, best laid plans…..Emma ended up sick and couldn’t go to school on Monday (good thing I took the day off of work, I guess).  I still tried to make the most of this by tackling the worst room in the house – Emma’s room.

I had in my mind that if I could organize all of the little girl things in labeled storage boxes, life would be a little more organized for the little diva.  We made a trip to WalMart (I hate that store), all I said to little Miss Em is that I wanted to get some boxes to put things in and that we would put a sign on them she could find the things she wanted to play with.  That was the extent of the conversation about the boxes.  When we got home, she sat on her bed as I tried to put things into said boxes.  I made great progress.  By the time the boys came home from school, I was done (not complete but done as is emotionally done).  I asked Em to pick up the last few items of clothes and such from her floor and I proceeded the afternoon drill of homework, etc.  I figured I would finish a little later.

Later that night, I went to help Em get ready for bed.  The floor of her room was empty and closet door closed.  I was a little scared but then I opened to see this…

Neatly stacked boxes, with lids on them.  Keep in mind, the boxes were still being filled when I stopped the project.

As I looked closer…

This is her “Radio”

 

 

 

 

Box of Babys…

 

 

 

 

And finally (don’t worry I had to ask for help on this one too)…

Activities (or actifadese).  A box that includes games, coloring books and work books.

 

 

 

Not exactly how I had envisioned labeling these boxes but it does the trick and the fact that she did this all by herself is more than I could have asked for when I said “Clean your room”!

 

Happy 60th!

Happy 60th Birthday Dad!!

Happy Birthday to the most patient, kind and opinionated father I know! The world is a better place because you are in it. I’m grateful and lucky to call you Dad. Thanks for teaching us to enjoy the little things in life and that having a bowl of cold cereal for a late night snack is totally acceptable. You are a great Dad and Grandpa and we are excited to celebrate the big 6-0 with you today.

Thanks for being there, every step of the way. Love You and Happy Birthday!

Remember - growing old is mandatory, growing up is optional.