Eden at eight months

Eden is eight months old today. Time is certainly flying by for me. Eden is growing up and we finally got her a bang trim to go along with her "older" age. Trimming bangs on an almost 8-month-old is not the easiest thing to do and so they are a little crooked. Oh well, we brush the bangs to the side and pretend they are supposed to be like that.

I finally dug out all of Emma and Avery's 12 month/12-18 month spring and summer clothing and added them to Eden's closet. I must say it expanded her wardrobe hugely! The girl should not be lacking in spring and summer clothes unless we hit a freak cold spell over the next few months. It is so much fun to pull out the other girls old clothing and remember them wearing the same outfits. And Eden is continuing to fill the clothes out at an early pace. The outfit she is wearing today and these pictures is a 12-18 month outfit.

Eden doesn't seem as interested in her bottle lately for some reason. I can only get her to take 4 oz. at a time right now. I'm not sure if it is because she is teething, has a cold or a combination of the two. It seems early to introduce the sippy cup but if she continues shying away from the bottle, we might try it soon. She does a good job eating her baby food though and we eat a lot of it now - morning, noon and night. And we have ventured into the meat foods (chicken and applesauce, turkey and rice, etc.) but I think her favorite is still the fruit. Give her mango or banana and blueberries any day.

She laughs a lot and her two big sisters love to help take care of her. She is sitting better on her own but I'm not sure how long it would last. She isn't crawling yet but she does still enjoy lying on the floor and rolling around or jumping around in her jumperoo.

Emma's fifth birthday

Emma turned five years old on March 10th! As most people are aware, my Grandmother O'Brien passed away and so I flew out on Emma's actual birthday to Michigan for the funeral services. But before I skipped town leaving Michael to care for the four kids, I picked up cupcakes for her preschool class, made a lasagna for the birthday dinner and found a yummy looking cake at Publix for the group to enjoy that evening. Michael snapped a few pictures for me so I could see what went on that evening.

We don't celebrate with large parties for each of our kids' birthdays, but turning five is a big one so we let each kid decide what they would like to do in honor of their birthday.

Emma chose to invite her preschool class and a few good friends to play at Monkey Joes. So the Saturday after I got back to town, we made our way to Monkey Joes for the big party.


Emma got a special seat reserved especially for the birthday kid...

I saw this cake at Publix and had to order it. It is ridiculous how much we paid for it, but the princess castle was too perfect and I wasn't about to try and build a castle cake on my own. As a bonus, Publix cakes are sooo good.

After sending Michael out to scour all of Columbia for the remaining bags of Silly Bandz - I finally was able to assemble the goody bags in order Friday night. And, yes, the Silly Bandz were worth it - the kids love those things!

A group shot of everyone enjoying refreshments. We had pizza, cake, ice cream and Sprite. Jamie Oliver would be so proud of our lunch nutritional content - ha!

Monkey Joe himself made a special visit to give Emma a hug and a birthday gift. She now wears her Monkey Joe t-shirt with pride. We call it "the walking advertisement." The number for the play park is even printed on the back of the shirt in big black numbers!

Emma had a good birthday party and the best part - no clean up for Mom and Dad! We packed our stuff up in our car and off we went.

Old Stone Church

A few weeks ago we drove to Anderson, SC to visit my in-laws. I had mentioned to Michael that I had read some interesting stories about an old church and its standing cemetery that is located in Clemson and so we thought it would make a good stop while we were in the area.

Although I lived in the Clemson area for at least six years and drove by this old church on an almost daily basis, I never knew anything about it's historic background. Old Stone Church was built in 1802. The original structure burned down in 1796 and a new church was built beginning in 1797. This is the church structure that is still standing.

The church is open to the public and you can go in and see the simple church much like it was years ago. One interesting piece of history is that The Old Stone Church was the first church in South Carolina to allow slaves to be members. They were not only permitted to enjoy the church services, but were welcomed as members, sitting in the gallery at the rear of the church.

The Old Stone Church was not only used as a church. It served as a school, and in 1919, the first Sunday School in the Upstate was held at the Old Stone Church. The builders of the church knew that living this close to Indians was dangerous. The church could double as a fort if it were needed. Therefore, they built heavy wooden doors which could close over the glass windows to add protection.

The cemetery is home to many interesting people including General Robert Anderson who fought in the Revolutionary War, General Andrew Pickens who was responsible for treaties with the native Cherokee Indians that resulted in many settlers being able to acquire land on which they began their new lives, Osenappa, a Cherokee Indian who converted to Christianity and helped teach other Indians about his new found religion.

The gravestone pictured above belonged to Eliza Huger. As the story goes Eliza was a young, “loose” woman who had been buried there, but only on the condition that a high wall be erected around her resting place so she wouldn’t somehow contaminate other places of rest. Her gravestone has been struck by lightening so many times that it is hard to read any of the inscription.

I got a few pictures of each of the kids in front of Old Stone Church...Avery...

Ryan...

And Emma. I missed grabbing a picture of Eden since she was hanging out in the car.

We drove through the Clemson campus and through the downtown area that now looks so different to me. I can't get over how much more they have in town now but it is good to see some things never change - like this picture of Tillman Hall.

Eden at seven months

Here is my baby at 7 months old! As you can see from the front of her dress, she is drooling a good bit of the time now. Eden has her two front lower teeth in and I believe her top front teeth are trying to make their way through now.

Eden's hair is so long in the front now, we have to pull it back into a ponytail everyday otherwise it hangs over her eyes and makes it hard for her to see!

She loves to make smacking noises with her mouth now and I swear I heard her say "Mommy!" the other day while driving around in the mini-van. We'll continue to work on that one...


She stays busy playing in her jumperoo and rolling around. She isn't sitting on her own yet but I think we are getting close.

She is eating all types of baby food now...fruits, vegetables, meat and mixtures. She seems to enjoy the fruits and sweet potatoes the most. Green beans don't get her very excited! We have introduced the infant rice cakes for sucking on but they still make me a little nervous since she seems to get a piece caught in the back of her mouth every time!

She is a great sleeper and generally sleeps from around 8:00 p.m. until 8:00 a.m. - can't complain about that! In fact, there really isn't much to complain about at all with this sweet little girl - unless it is the fact that she is growing up way too fast on me!