Wordless Wednesday...well, almost!

ONE and FIVE!

In late February, Piper turned ONE!  In early March, Halle turned FIVE!  I know this post is a little (or a lot) late, but better late than never, right?  Being that their birthdays are so close together, we try to make sure that we have a separate special day for each.  We don't have all of the kids' friends or their cousins here in Orlando, so we don't do the traditional party.  Mamaw and Papaw (Chris' parents) did come down that week, so it was still exciting for them. 

For Piper's birthday, we let her go through the "her age" toy section to see if anything caught her eye. She roamed and played with almost everything! We ended up just picking out a couple of toys for her, and then we went to pick up her cake.

 



She wasn't really sure what to do with the cake, but once she got going, I think she decided that

she  liked it!

Once she was finished, though, she wanted Daddy to clean off her hands right away.  She didn't like that she could wipe off all of the icing and cake.









Halle requested that for her day we take her to Build-A-Bear to spend some of her birthday money, and she wanted to shop at the mall with what she had left over.  After taking her out to breakfast, we headed to Build-A-Bear.  She choose to build a Hello Kitty, and promptly named her Molly.

Here she is putting Molly's heart inside of her.

She really liked giving her a bath.

She even let big sister in on some of the fun!

It makes me sad that our little girls are growing up so fast, but I'm very proud of them!





Mr. Mugsy

Since we decided to lease our house in Trenton instead of selling it, we haven't yet bought a permanent house here in Orlando.  That causes our weekends to be very free!  At home, if we had a free weekend, it was almost always spent working in the yard or updating something on our house.  Being that we have no house maintenance here, we are constantly looking for things to fill our weekends (if we aren't at the beach).  So, during one of our outings in downtown Orlando, we came across a little dog rescue group called Florida Little Dog Rescue.  It's locally owned and basically they scour the pounds rescuing as many dogs as they can.  Many are hurt and hungry.  They adopt the dogs out of the pounds, fully vet them, and place them in one of their foster homes.  Once in a home, they try to get a feel of the personality of the dog, guide potty training, and give lots of love!  This is where we met Mugsy.

When we all decided to adopt a dog, Chris made the request that we adopt one that actually needed adopting.  When he saw Mr. Mugsy that weekend, he knew that this was our dog.  See, Mr. Musgy has only 3 legs.  He was dropped off at the vet with only 3, so FLDR didn't know any details about how he had lost it.  Halle fell in love immediately.  According to Halle, Mugsy was special.  Like her.  Halle calls her little eye "special", and whenever she sees a child/animal with a disability or just something not "perfect" or ordinary, she refers to the disability or abnormality as special.  This isn't a "special" like she is feeling sorry for anyone; she uses her meaning for "special" to mean a blessing.  She was very excited that Mr. Mugsy was so special, like her.  Yeah, Mugsy was the one for us, and FLDR agreed! 

This was the weekend that we met Mr. Mugsy.  He was talking because he was so excited to have some kids to play with!  As long as our visitations went well (they went fantastically!), we were able to take him home later that day!

He has turned out to be an amazing little dog.  He meshed with our family perfectly.  Even Piper, just learning to walk at that time, didn't phase him.  He loves to lie on the back of the couch, and if he is in our bed, he likes to be under the covers that I have at the foot of our bed.



He loves to ride in the car with us, and he prefers to hang his head out of the window while we are driving.  If he can't do that, he is content to find a lap to lie down in.  He hates for the girls to go outside to play without him.  If they leave, he cries at the door for them.  He is just perfect!