Check Out These Mad Skills!

A few weeks ago, while my mom was here spending a couple of nights while Lane was out of town, she and Dane played a little one on one basketball in his room.

For those of you who don't know, my mother loves basketball and once starred (pretty sure that part's not true) on a vicious half-court Class B high school basketball team in rural Southwest Arkansas - The Blevins Hornets. I know that you've all heard great tales of that team. The only thing that really kept her from dominating was her struggle to keep her asthma medicine from falling out of her shorts pocket!

Anyway, she showed Dane how he could slam dunk by jumping off the edge of his bed over to his basketball goal. That sounds like a normal grandmotherly thing to teach your grandson, doesn't it? Actually, these are the things that I love to see him getting to share with her because it reminds me so much of me, Robyn and Joe David running and sliding through our Grandmama's legs on her slippery kitchen floor. These are the precious, happy moments that grandkids always remember!

As I'm sure you can imagine, he loves his new trick. So, in honor of NBA All-Star Weekend coming up in a couple of weeks, we had our very own slam dunk championship tonight.

Enjoy the pictures - I think I'm going to get a couple of these enlarged as posters for his room and for Lane's office. It was really fun! The energy and enthusiasm of a 3 year old boy is truly a wonder to behold!

Sweet jump shot!

That's right, a two-ball dunk.

High above the rim!

Look at that tongue! Reminds me of another great dunker.

I love his perfect hand form!

Swish!

Time for bed!

Playground Update - Stage 2 (Swings!) & Some Sweet Shots of Sydni, Too!

This weekend was very exciting around here - Stage 2 construction began and was completed on our playground - Swings! The grandparents all came through in a huge way at Christmas and helped to provide almost all of the supplies necessary to add the swingset on to the fort and slide that Lane built earlier in the fall. Thanks so much! We were able to put on a infant/toddler swing for Sydni, which she loves, a swing for Dane, and a heavy duty swing for either a kid or an adult up to 350 pounds! So, even if we let ourselves go a little, we can still swing with our kids! That's looking on the bright side, huh? Just kidding! Lane and Dane worked all afternoon until dark on Saturday, and they had everything ready to start hanging the swings up this afternoon after church. After lunch today, they got back to work and had everything ready by about 3:00. Dane was so excited about his swing, and I was really surprised at how much Sydni liked her swing, too. This was her first time to swing at all, and she immediately started smiling and laughing and didn't stop until I took her out. It was a really fun and special time with my kids.

Last week, a sweet lady from church gave Sydni this sweet antique doll cradle for her room. So, yesterday I set it up and thought I would see if Sydni was able to hold onto it and stand up by herself for a little bit. She did pretty well and was able to stand for 5-10 second intervals before falling down. Eventually, she fell and started crying, so we stopped, but she did so great!

This morning, as I was dressing Sydni for church, she rolled over into this position, and I just thought it was so adorable. I got Lane to run and get the camera, and luckily, I was able to capture the moment. Sweet girl! Oh, yeah, Thursday, we went to the dr. for her 6 month checkup, and she did great and is very healthy and happy. Her weight is 16 lbs. 4 oz. (55th %), her height is 26 inches (58th %), and her head circum. is 16.5 inches (32nd %).

Sydni's First Half-Birthday!

Saturday, Sydni turned 6 months old. We were on our way back from our vacation to New Mexico then, so we didn't take her official pictures until today, once we were all rested and recovered from the long trip!

This month, Sydni has continued to grow and can do many new things. She cut her second tooth on Dec. 18th, so she now has her two cute bottom teeth. It's amazing how bad it hurts when she bites down on your finger, even without the top teeth being there yet. I'm sure it will really hurt once the top ones come through.

She is eating her baby food very well, and we are in the process of introducing new flavors to her. So far, her favorites are squash, sweet potatoes, pears and applesauce. We tried sweet peas today, and she liked them pretty well, too. She does not like carrots, green beans or prunes. However, on vacation this past week, I smashed up some green beans that I fixed for dinner one night, and she ate about ten of those, so I guess she just needs a little more flavor to them. We also went with my mom to Red Lobster for lunch a couple of weeks ago, and she was content to sit in the high chair the whole time as long as I kept giving her bits of garlic cheese biscuits! Yummy!

She is now sitting up by herself pretty well. Of course, she still tumbles over some when she reaches for things, especially if she's got one of her thumbs in her mouth! Speaking of that, it is really funny to feed her now, because as soon as the spoon comes out of her mouth, her thumb goes in until the next bite is ready.

Her personality is so sweet, and she is just so pleasant to be around. She doesn't cry much, but when she does, her little face just looks completely heartbroken. I love how much she smiles, and I love that she smiles so easily.

All in all, it has been a great month, and we are so proud that she is our little girl.

Pictures from Christmas

It's been a while since I updated my blog, and I needed to report on all of our holiday happenings! We had a great Christmas and got to spend time with a lot of our family members and had a great time catching up with them. We didn't get to see some family, and we sure missed them and hope to get to see them soon, too.

Here are some family photos after church on the Sunday before Christmas.

We spent a couple of days with Lane's family down at his sister and brother-in-law's new place. It was a nice, relaxing time, and it was great to get to see them all. Lane got his Christmas present from me early, so that he could take it down there and play. I got him Rock Band 2, which is the most fun thing I have encountered in quite a while! You wouldn't be able to tell it from looking at me, but I happen to be quite the drummer! It is so fun, and Lane and I have been "rocking out" most nights after the kids go to bed. I guess we had the volume up too loud one night, because the next morning, Dane told Lane that he heard us "rocking out last night". I think it's funny that he just stayed in bed and didn't come out and tell us. He must have been really tired. Here's some pictures of us hard rockers - Our Rock Band names are Juarritos (Lane) and Red Cat (Mary).

We've decided that we are going to try to make Christmas Eve a really special night for our little family of four. We get to open the presents that we got each other that night (a Bowers family tradition), then we get Santa's cookies and milk all set out and ready, write him a thank you note, get our new PJ's on, grab a cup of coffee (or coffee milk, in Dane's case) and get in the car for one last, long ride around to look at Christmas lights. As the kids get older, we are going to try to go to Marshall to look at the lights there on Christmas Eve, but it's just a little too far now. When we got home from our lights tour this year, Lane put Dane up on his shoulders and stood in the front yard to look for Santa and his sleigh. Well, Dane claims that he spotted Rudolph, so we hurried in, and Dane went right to sleep. He was so excited, but so tired.







I woke up at 7:45 Christmas morning, looked at my watch, and decided that I couldn't wait any longer, so I went into Dane's room and said, "Dane, guess who came!" That's all I said, and I am not exaggerating when I say that he opened his eyes instantly, and he literally popped out of bed in less then 3 seconds and was running to see what Santa brought him! Lane went in and woke Sydni up, too. Her reaction was not nearly as exciting.















We spent a couple of hours enjoying our gifts and then headed to my parents house for a few days there. We got to stay there for three days, and it was so nice to get to all be together. The kids were all so sweet and played so well together. I forgot to take many pictures there, except for when we got all six grandkids together for a picture. Lane had to preach on Sunday so he had to go home Saturday, but the kids and I got to stay and go to church in Daingerfield with all of my family. It doesn't happen very often that we all get to be there together, so it was very special.

All six grandkids (Jed was mesmerized with his mother)

The beautiful and sweet granddaughters!

I'll end the post with a couple of pictures of Sydni from today. Sydni has had a cold all week, so I've been keeping her in so that she can get rid of it. Lane took Dane down to Timpson to see family for New Years Eve, so it was just us girls here last night and today. When Dane was just about Sydni's age, I got the sweetest picture of him with my cat, C. John, so I had been hoping that I would be able to do the same with Sydni. Today was the day, and I got the sweetest pictures of them together. I wish you could see her shirt, too, because she's wearing a cat onesie!

Dane & C. John, back in June 2006

I hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas holiday - and Happy New Year!