Another Birthday Shout-Out!

Sorry this is so late Pawcaw. I thought I would get back to the blog before your birthday but didn't.

So here it goes, 2 days late...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAWCAW!

Love,

John Reagan and Evie

(Greg and Brandi too)

A Birthday Shout-Out

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM

otherwise known as Fifi.

I will be nice and not tell your age. Since you are going to be very unhappy about the first picture, I will cut you some slack. As I am typing this, John Reagan is looking at the picture of Fifi and Evie saying, "Happy Birthday Fifi," and calling Evie Kenden! He is silly! He will probably tell you Happy Birthday everyday for a month now.

Hope you have a great birthday! Sorry we can't be there to share it with you.

Lots of Love from John Reagan, Evie, Greg, and Brandi

What do PJ's and the Washing Machine have in common?

I know you are thinking, "Okay Brandi, the answer to your question is quite obvious." Maybe in the real world it is an obvious answer, but here at the Hasley House it is not what you are thinking. My answer is...John Reagan of course. He has been the sweetest little thing here lately. Now in reality, we have had a few bad moments, but in the larger picture, he has been extra sweet and loving for the past 2 weeks.

To jump right into my story, John Reagan and Evie got somewhat matching PJ's for Christmas. They obviously aren't exactly matching because with a boy and girl that is just impossible, and these aren't the same pajamas they wore Christmas Eve either. These were pj's from Pawcaw and Nana...the kinds with the footies. Now I love footie pajamas for Evie because she needs them at this age, but I have never bought any for John Reagan after he turned a year old. And sorry Nana to have to admit this, but when I first opened them for John Reagan I was less than excited. I just knew there was no way I was going to get that child to wear his. But I failed to recognize at the time my secret weapon. Oh yes, I had a secret weapon. These pajamas came from PAWCAW AND NANA! All I had to do the first time was ask John Reagan if he wanted to wear his pj's from Pawcaw and Nana, and you can guess the response. So we dressed John Reagan and Evie in the matching pajamas, and they were the most adorable things. I have come to love the pajamas and love to dress them in the pj's at the same time. It's just too cute. The second time around of getting John Reagan in his wasn't as easy though. I told him we had to take a picture of him and Evie "in their matching pjs." That worked until Evie fell asleep before we got the picture, then John Reagan wanted his off. We managed to keep him in them until he fell asleep. And we took the pictures when they woke up. The third time around with the pajamas...John Reagan put them right on and told me the next morning while rubbing his pjs, "Momma, I like my pjs."

Aren't they just too sweet. Because Greg was not here I just laid Evie in the bed with John Reagan. I didn't want to fight with getting them both on the couch and Evie sitting up long enough for me to get the picture.

Now you can see what I mean about my buddy being such a sweetie. What a great big brother he is! He has also been my BIG time helper when it comes to laundry here lately. Hence the pajama and washing machine question.
He loves to help me put clothes in the dryer and help put the clothes in the washer too. There are several laundry pictures here, but I didn't want you to miss the progression.

He just kept getting farther and farther into the washing machine. Because we didn't buy the pedestals when we bought the washer and dryer, they fit his level perfectly. The first time he more or less bailed into the washing machine, all I could think was "I need my camera." So the next time he came to help me, I was sure to bring my camera. He gets so excited now when I tell him we have clothes to put in the dryer. Man I love this age.

Now that I have doted on how sweet and great John Reagan is, I have to give Evie some loves too. We have loved every stage that John Reagan goes through and always think we aren't ready for him to grow out of that stage until he hits the next one, and it has all the perks of before plus some. We are at that point with Evie. She has hit such a great age. She is so lovable and fun. She does great in her bouncy...half sitting half standing taking in all that is going on and talking up a storm.

She loves playing with the toys, and they are great chew toys. She is a good multitasker already. She knows how to play with her toys, watch cartoons, and smile all at the same time. How do you like those skills?

We can't believe she is already 6 months; yet, we can hardly remember life without her.

And no, her hair is not red. It's just the flash. In person IT IS brown.

We had an exciting week last week. Pawpaw Donnie and Mawmaw Betty came up and visited. They stayed with daddy's sister, my Aunt Mary and Uncle Gordon, who live in Bellevue. We went up Tuesday after Pawpaw and Mawmaw got here and spent the day. Everyone had a great time passing Evie around and loving on John Reagan.

Mawmaw and Pawpaw with Evie. Like John Reagan at Evie's age, Evie loved staring at Pawpaw's cowboy hat. For those of you who know John Reagan and his fetish with all things horses, bull riding, and cowboys, you now know where it came from.

Uncle Gordon put in the movie "Cars" or "Cool McQueen" as John Reagan calls it, and the men (and mommy) had a great time watching the movie. Here Pawpaw and John Reagan are engrossed in what is going on.

Aunt Mary and Uncle Gordon have a maltese named Louka. Seeing as how Evie has Duchess to stare at and love on, she understands doggies. Here she is giving Louka some "human puppy" sugars. That is how Uncle Gordon explains babies to Louka. Aunt Mary and Grandma Annie Rai are helping Evie and Louka socialize.

If you haven't put two and two together (which I am sure you have), Grandma is daddy and Aunt Mary's mother, my grandmother, Evie and John Reagan's great-grandmother. I am so good at stating the obvious, aren't I? I think it is absolutely wonderful that John Reagan and Evie still have 2 great-grandparents to love on them, and I try to never miss the opportunity to take pictures of my babies with my grandmothers, especially the kind like this one.

On Wednesday, Pawpaw, Mawmaw, Uncle Gordon, Aunt Mary, and Louka came to visit us. We made brownie bites to celebrate and for Kimberly's birthday. Shame, shame! Kimberly missed her brownies. Sorry girl! I will make you a special batch next time we get together. Anyway, John Reagan loves anything junk food, including batter. He has already learned all about scraping the bowl, and this was the only way we could convince him to come inside and let everyone warm up.

When we have family up for company, John Reagan thinks he is supposed to play outside with them. I really shouldn't generalize with the family word. When we have Pawcaw and Nana up, John Reagan does a lot of playing outside, so he thought since Uncle Gordon and Pawpaw Donnie were here, that meant let's go outside. Who cares that it was 20 degrees...not really that cold, but I am pretty sure it was one of those mid to high 20s days. John Reagan already knows who plays outside with him. An update on daddy for those of you who might not have heard...He went to the doctor 2 weeks ago for his 4 week check-up, and the doctor said he looked great. The doc also said he would release daddy in 2 weeks to go to work...which is this week. However, Daddy decided to stay off until February 1st. Thanks for all your prayers. He is doing remarkably well, and it is very clear that God had a hand in Daddy's recovery.

Just a side note, while I was typing this blog I let John Reagan play with some markers. Needless to say, Evie has a few marker spots on the face. How sweet of John Reagan!

When I decide to get off my rear and scan the picture, I will share our family picture from Evie's baby dedication, almost 3 months ago. Yes I am being slow about it.

Hope you all are well, especially you Jon and Kelsey. I am going to send you an email one day soon. Love you guys.

Brandi

Recovering from the "Jolli-Days"

We are back. Hasley Hogwash is not doomed to enter into forever oblivion. I hope you are as excited about that as I am. Our hiatus is over...at least I hope so. We experienced the never ending holiday trip this year. For starters, we weren't our typical excited selves about the holidays and for the first time ever were ready for them to be over with. Because of all the craziness leading up to the holidays, we were not in full spirit. On top of that, Greg got the stomach virus Christmas Eve day. He then passed it on to Evie 2 days later, then John Reagan 2 days after that, then me 2 days after that. Get the picture yet. Now let's add a cherry on top of this wild cream sandwich...I started itching like crazy the day we arrived in LA. By Christmas Eve I had a full blown rash from the face to the legs. I will go ahead and mention the fact that I kept the rash the whole 2 weeks we were there and finally went to the dermatologist on Wednesday. A nice little shot and some cream later, I think I have recouped. Greg also gave my mom, his mom, and his dad the virus. What fun! Now I am going to completely and totally blow your world away. We had to rent a small U-Haul trailer to make it home with all of John Reagan and Evie's loot. Crazy! Crazy! Crazy! As you have figured out now, we did make it home and did get all the Christmas decorations down and gifts put up. I can't believe we can actually see the floor. The bad news is we ran through the whirlwind of the holidays and didn't spend the time needed to reflect on the true meaning of Christmas. So we have to start right now on revamping our holiday traditions. We don't want next January to be like this January..."Mommy, where's the Christmas tree. Santa Claus coming?" We would prefer something along the lines of, "Mommy, we celebrated Jesus' birthday!" Any ideas while they are still fresh in your mind?

Our Christmas events started earlier than usual this year. We had Christmas lunch with family on the 21st instead of the 24th. When I say family, I mean my mom's mom, my aunt, and all my cousins. We are always minus an aunt and usually 3 sets of cousins, but one set made it in from North Carolina this year.

I had John Reagan's portable DVD player out to keep him entertained, and as you can see, it kept quite a few of the kiddos entertained. On that note, Greg and I were temporarily without children this day. Everyone held Evie and took care of her while we visited, and John Reagan did just what you see above along with play a little bit.

Here are all the great-grands (minus 2 in VA). You can barely see Gracee in the left, back corner.

For those of you who have never seen my sister and might wonder what she looks like when you hear about her children, here is a picture for you. This is Brad, Marla, Breyden, and Kenden.

We did get the opportunity to go down and visit Daddy a couple of times while we were home.

Evie is all bundled up and ready to go see Pawpaw Donnie in her adorable vest from Auntie Marla.

This is Pawpaw Donnie and Breyden. John Reagan was supposed to be in this picture, but you can see below what he was doing instead.

John Reagan is a big fan of horses (Why? We don't have a clue). Pawpaw Donnie has 2 horses, so we got to go pet the horses and feed them apples. It was great fun!

Back at Fifi's house...mom has the neatest pantry. The doors have shelves on them, then there are 2 double-sided swiveling shelves (the best way I know to explain) that open up to more shelves in the back. Very hard to explain, but great fun for grandkids.

Breyden loved to play in the pantry and so does John Reagan. Here he is taking a rest and drinking his chocolate milk. It is a great place to play peek-a-boo.

We let John Reagan and Evie open their stockings before we went to LA. I didn't figure Evie would pay any attention to what was going on, but she went crazy flailing her arms all over the place.

Needless to say, she is a "girly" girl because she loves her little bear and her baby doll she got for Christmas.

She was also teething over the holidays. Her first tooth broke through on the way down there and her second right after we got home.

Here she is working those gums over with her 2 fingers. I thought this was the cutest thing.

Remember the "What is Evie's is John Reagan's post?" Well here is a follow up to that post.

Mom has a saucer at her house for the babies. It was Breyden's, then John Reagan's, and now Kenden and Evie share. As you can see, John Reagan took his share of turns in it. I don't know about you, but I think he might be getting a little big for it.

Because Christmas lunch with extended family was moved up a few days, we were able to spend a little more time at Pawcaw and Nana's on Christmas Eve. John Reagan and Daddy like to fish, and when Pawcaw is around he goes too. In other words, fishing is Pawcaw, Daddy, and John Reagan's thing. John Reagan has a "fish pole" he gets out and plays with in the house. Well, he found Pawcaw's stash while we were there. Not only did he find Pawcaw's fish poles, but he found a fish.

This is John Reagan's BIG catch for the day. This fish came on a flower arrangement for Greg's grandpa when he passed away. He was a fisherman, and now John Reagan is helping carry on that tradition.

Greg with the stomach bug.

Evie's blanket was on hand when Daddy got the chills. I thought this would be a good bribery picture.

Christmas with Pawpaw and Fifi...I could only put a few pictures on here, so I chose the horse trailer and truck. Last year Breyden got a blue horse trailer and truck and that was all John Reagan played with.

So John Reagan got his very own this year. He was quick to tell Breyden "mine."

Marla and I started a new tradition this year. We decided to buy christmas pajamas for each other's children to wear for Christmas morning. John Reagan and Evie would give Breyden and Kenden pajamas and vise versa.

This was our best attempt at wrangling them for their pj picture.

Evie loving on her cabbage patch doll from Pawpaw and Fifi. I'm telling you she loves giving her babies lovin's.

Playing on Christmas Day!

John Reagan got a basketball goal from Santa.

Playing with Christmas at Pawcaw and Nana's

Now here's the BIG toy! Pawcaw couldn't resist buying John Reagan his first 4-wheeler as John Reagan refers to it.

Uncle Brad and Auntie Marla's

Uncle Brad and Auntie Marla just built a new house and moved in while we were there. We went to visit and celebrate Kenden's 1st birthday. Breyden's christmas last year was an alligator. He likes to ride John Reagan around on it, and anyone who will ride with him for that matter.

He even lets John Reagan drive. Aren't they too cute? Of course Breyden had to help John Reagan with his steering on occasion.

Kenden turned 1 on Dec. 28th

I can't believe how fast a year goes by now. Here is cutie pie Kenden eating up his birthday cake.

Remember John Reagan and the big drawing paper at Fifi's?

Well he likes to hide under it as much as he likes to color on it.

Home AT LAST!!

Daddy unloaded the trailer on Sunday after we made it home. This would be Sunday, the 4th. John Reagan naturally wanted to take a spin in the 4-wheeler. He also wanted Duchess to ride with him. This is classic. Cracks me up every time.

Hope I haven't pushed you into overload. One day I will write a short blog. Hey, I did good when pairing down the number of pictures I put on here. There were lots more I wanted to add. Maybe Greg will assume the "short blogger" responsibility...lol!

Brandi