It's a first...

We have been waiting and waiting for this...Abby lost her first tooth!  :)  It seems like it has been loose forever, and since she is almost 7, she felt like it was past time to lose one!  

It was while Grandma, Pawpaw, UB & GG Jane were here.  We went to check out the Dulles Air & Space Museum that day, and went to Moe's for a late lunch.  Abby loves her some Moe's.  She loves it even more now...

Right after she pulled the tiny little thing from her mouth!

 This is where it happened...  :)

Thank goodness Mommy finished the Tooth Fairy Pillow...

Abby would've had to shove that thing back in there!

 I just don't remember baby teeth being this itty bitty--that thing is TINY.

 Here is her ballerina fairy tooth pillow...in case you get the itch to make one yourself, here is the info!

Abby thought she might get $20 from the Tooth Fairy. :)  After I stopped laughing, I told her that inflation hadn't gone up that much.  The Tooth Fairy used to bring me 25 cents, so I think her $1 was just about right!

Love, The Johnsons

a peek @ halloween...

I'm so slow these days...here's a peek at the big night.

Abby was a machine.

Give the girl a beautiful dress, send her out for a night of candy & compliment gathering and it's a big night.

Beks...not so much.

She visited maybe 4 houses & wanted to go home for the stroller!

She didn't want to go home--she had fun watching Abby Trick or Treat!  :)

Short on time, we were!  We did fancy princess hair & everything...you can tell we were in a hurry because there aren't 100+ pictures of their hairdos!  :)  You can thank me later!

Beautiful Cinderella (in her wedding dress!)--Daddy wasn't crazy about the wedding dress part, but she sure looked amazingly cute (even with the extra layers & shoes she wasn't crazy about wearing)!

 Cinderella & Belle waiting to leave...good thing you can't see Belle's irritation with me!

 Not much patience with Mommy, but here they are posing with their pumpkins!

<Note: Abby is sitting on the *shoes*>

Daddy sure does nice work!  :)

all i have to say is...

GO Cards!

UPDATE:  And GO they did...what an awesome post-season!  :)  Can you say, WORLD CHAMPIONS??!

one day in maine

I'm so fast at blog updating.  Like lightening.  :)
Daddy came home, and we have just enjoyed being together.  Oh, and I homeschool.  And occasionally try to clean my home.  For some reason, life just doesn't stand still...and it couldn't be my outstanding time management skills.  Because, well, they are nonexistent outstanding these days.
Okay, enough with the excuses.  Here are the pictures of our very first day in Maine.
I wish we could go back already.  It was AMAZING!

We drove into Boothbay, and this was our first stop... 

Waited in line for 30-45 minutes, so we were hoping for the best.

It was good...the Bobby Flay "Throwdown" Crab Cakes were our favorite here.

 We (of course) also had a lobster roll--our first one of the trip!  :)

Oh, how I love lobster.

Love.

We are UPtown kinda people.

Beks thought this was cool.

Here was the view outside our lovely room at Ocean Point Inn.

There was a pool, a duck pond, all sorts of wonderful views.

Our first meal at the hotel.

No reservations on a holiday weekend.

That's how we roll!

They stuck us at a table they (thankfully) had in the back...we still managed to have amazing views.

Mommy chose the best meal.

Lobster Stew.  Yum.

Here's to the first installment of Maine...let's hope it doesn't take me another 3 weeks to get to the next bit!

soccer girl?

So...

our little monkey has started soccer.

Beks has been waiting for a whole year;

she wanted to play last year when Abby moaned the whole season

returned to the soccer field after a two-year sabbatical during the time we were in Korea.

Doesn't she look tough?

Here's her game face...

um, let's just say she wasn't feeling herself for the first practice.

And second practice.

Oh, and the first game, but we can look forward to another post on that one!

This is pretty much her team spirit up to this point...she is actually closer to her team here than she is most of the time!

And here we are finishing up for the day...

no worries, there is more to come.

The season lasts until November.

Awesome.

field trip...

Last week, we decided to take Daddy on a little trip to explore something else in D.C.

On the agenda for the day...Union Station & the National Postal Museum!

Here we are in the food court at Union Station.

We all picked what we wanted!

The girlies (of course!) picked Chinese!

All smiles with their daddy!

Posing at the National Postal Museum...

One of our favorite parts of the museum...

OWNEY!

We now have a book about him & 20 stamps!  :)

{he looks a little too real in this picture!!}

One more cute one with Daddy...

We walked by a cupcake place when we first got there-
Do you think the girls forgot about it?  :)
We heard about it for most of the day, so on our way out, Daddy got the girlies some treats.
{Mommy got one too...I got a coffee!}

Abby ordered a Cosmo cupcake...

Until next time...

guess who's home?!

{Small note...blogger is driving me CRAZY.  I lost the ENTIRE first post I wrote.  This does not make me want to update.  It makes me want to drink wine.}

Well, he has actually been home for almost a week!

You'll have to forgive me for my laziness...

our family is back together again!

We have been busy just spending time together & working on getting Brad's sleep back on track.

So, last Tuesday night, we headed to Baltimore-Washington International airport to pick up Daddy!

Finally!

The extra fun part was that we got to have company...

our friends, Anastassia, Athena & Elias went with us!

I didn't want Anasstasia to have to take the kiddos to the airport,

but she said she could go & take a video for us.

I've never had a video.  It sounded pretty wonderful!

{oh, and blogger won't load my video.  seriously?}

I'm not sure I've even had a picture to prove I go to pick him up!

Thankfully, they live 15 minutes from the airport, so I didn't feel quite as bad!

Here we are waiting.

There is a group who helps you at the airport, Operation Welcome Home Maryland.

To me, what they do is very special.

They thank every person coming off the plane & 

they have cowbells.

The cowbells kept Elias pretty entertained while he waited in his stroller!  :)

They told us where to wait & updated us to the best of their abilities.

When the military is involved, sometimes there is not definitive information involved.  I'm just sayin'.

Do you see the girl on the left side of the picture?

She is a young gal.  With a hubby on Brad's plane.

She texts & he texts=updated information on what is going on.

{Please don't text me.  I don't text!  We're so 2003.} 

And the gal in the white dress...on the right side of the photo.

She came from Little Rock to surprise her hubby.

That made me get teary.  Okay, what didn't?!

She & I also figured out we were both prior service, personnel officers, came off active duty in 2003 & knew some of the same people!

Crazy.  Well, okay.  It's not really that crazy in the Air Force.

Small world.

 More waiting...thank goodness someone was taking pictures!  :)  

My mind was on other things!

Abby said,

"It has been over 10 minutes.  I know it has been longer.  How long have we been waiting?  Why did that lady say 10 minutes?"

HAHAHA.

All things I thought myself...

More cuteness while waiting

Here is the special picture Abby made for Daddy  :)

As a mom & wife, I always worry about the reaction when Brad is gone & he comes home.

You want the girls to run to Daddy like he's been gone 7 months, but not freaked out because he has been gone for 7 months.  I don't know why I even gave it a second thought...it was perfect! 

They ran right to him & couldn't get enough!

LOVE this one!  

Now we have a cute little family picture...

thanks, Anastassia!  :)

Off to do all the fun things we have planned...

swimming, snuggling, road trip 2011, and all sorts of other adventures!

little ballerinas...

Here are the long-awaited ballet pictures...

okay, only the grandparents & daddy were getting a little bitter!

{and maybe an aunt or 2!}

Ballerina #1...

Beks has been waiting for this day.

For 3 years.  :)

Here is some sort of dance move/pose...

The bun...

or as Abby has informed me, a twist!

{this is as good as it gets...can't see me googling how to do it correctly any time soon!}

So cute!

Not a bit nervous...

she ran into the class on the first day & said,

"See you in a little bit, Mommy."

Can you believe all the pink cuteness?!

And the MOST important part of dance...

the dance stamps you get at the end of class!

The big girls' dance class.

There is something I haven't told you yet...

can you see who Abby is holding hands with?

Look closely.

It's Ella!

The Davis family has moved to Virginia!

{more on that later!}

Ms. Linda was wonderful!

How we feel about waiting during Abby's dance class!

More cute posing for me...

enjoy it, because she is moving on to bigger & better things.

She has chosen ice skating for her activity this year...and swimming.

These two are so precious together...

what a relationship.

From Korea to the states--wouldn't know we missed a whole year in there!

That's a wrap on summer dance!

Beks originally wanted dance to be her activity for the year...

not any more!

She has chosen SOCCER ONLY!

Be still her daddy's heart.

{stay tuned for some exciting stories!}