Happy Birthday Henry!!

Wow, I can't believe my little boy is already 2!!! It's amazing to me how every day he just seems to get cuter and cuter and I find myself loving him more and more.. yet at the same time, he does seem to test my patience more than ever at the same time.  I think this is one of the cutest ages yet - as he is learning so much every day, he's like a little parrot, repeating everything we say with his own cute little dialect, wanting to do everything on his own, learning to be more and more independent. I guess the tantrums and frustrations are just part of the learning process, but they do leave Chad and I continually praying to God for wisdom for how to deal with it all. He is a little daddy's boy and it just makes my heart smile at night when I can not peel him off of Chad's shoulder because he just loves to cuddle with his dad before bed. Sweet, sweet, stuff.. and it's just going by way too fast!
We had a wonderful time with friends and family celebrating his birthday a few weeks ago. Here are some pictures..

Thank you to my friend Keila for making these.. I cannot take credit! 

Fun with his cousins! 

Not sure what Olivia is thinking, but I love her face here

right after "blowing out his candles"/spitting all over cake!

Friends! 

Disney

In an effort to keep up with the blogging machine previously known as Suzanne, I guess I need to throw out some updates. With it being the final few days before we leave for our first Christmas celebration in Pensacola, I have a zillion other things I need to be doing, so will make this quick!

Suzanne is also known as the Guru of Disney, and we were happy to have our whole little family join she and the girls and mom for a fun filled day at the Happiest Place on Earth back in October. We took the plunge and got year passes, so I do hope to be making more visits soon! It was a long day, but lots of fun.

Splash park- Henry's favorite, not too surprising

Love these girls!

squeezed in a short nap

Someone did not want to pose

Yes, he's wearing a leash

My boy! 

He sucked on his fingers all day- hadn't done that before or since. Strange

Fun day!!

The Rocking Chair Project

My parents have always been good at updating and refinishing old furniture, so I guess I thought that I would be a natural at it. However, after I tackled this project, it wasn't long before I realized I was in over my head; so I ended up stopping for a few months, then doing some online research and re motivating myself to finish it up after a while. 

I spotted this old rocking chair at Chad's folks house. It didn't seem like it was getting much attention, so they seemed happy for me to take it if I was interested. It resided in our living room just like this for a while. One time Essie sat in it and made a comment about her bottom having a hole in it. I think I got started soon after that. 

I jumped right in and was making good progress at first, even though the simple task of pulling the old fabric off was a little more involved than expected as there were jillions of tacks and staples holding it down. Then, once I got it off, I realized I had no idea how to create a new seat, without a hole in it. I ignored that fact for a little while and went ahead and stripped and restained the wood. Then I took a long break.

Henry being very cooperative while I worked

After doing some research I decided to get some upholstery webbing and top it with foam to replace the seat. I think it worked ok, we'll see after it's been in use for a little while. 

I determined that upholstery is a little more frustrating and difficult to work with than just plain wood refinishing. I did end up enjoying the project, though and definitely learned some things in the process. Hopefully next time it won't take me nearly a year to get it done! Here's the chair with it's new yellow corduroy outfit. 

Lions, Tigers and Bears.. Oh My!!

Ok, so I don't think we saw a tiger or a bear.. but definitely some lions at the Jacksonville Zoo. Chad enjoyed the fact that I thought a lion without a mane was a tiger, but I quickly agreed that Tony the Tiger has stripes, so maybe I just wasn't thinking clearly at the time.  Anyway.. we had a great time. Chad was asked to go to Jacksonville to do some computer work and he figured we might as well make a little family trip out of it, so we did. And I guess we plan to go back, because we went ahead and signed up for a year long pass. If anyone is up for a zoo trip, let me know!

Chad calls Henry "Panda" for some reason, so this was fun

You should see the outtakes of this one.. Henry was totally freaking
out and ended up causing me to bang my head on the metal elephant. Ouch!

This might have been his favorite part, it was pretty fun
to get to feed the giraffe

Penguins!! An Overman family favorite.. looks like Henry will
fit in!

We managed to make the whole "loop" in 2 hours, but that didn't include playing at the splash park or much on the playground, so there is certainly more exploring to do. I think I was most intrigued by the anteater. What a strange looking creature!!! There were a lot of animals there that just made me really stop and be in awe of the imagination of our God!

Chad was there too, but the nice camera was tied around his neck, so he didn't make it in any of the photos.. let's see, I think I might have snapped one of him on my phone: