One of the BEST things about Our Boy.......

....Is that he is SO TOLERABLE of his sisters!!! Seriously, I have said it once and I will say it again, he is the BEST third child we could possibly have dreamed of!! Not only is he chill and layed back, but his overall all personality is so go with the flow (MOST of the time!). All I can really is that Ethan is JUST.PLAIN.AWESOME!! And if those words or the fact that you know him doesn't convince you then these pictures surely will!!



 

 I mean who is this still and patient while having not just ONE but TWO hair stylists working on you?

 Well, can you blame him for not being over the top THRILLED right now?

 The Work

Our Cute little Ethan Micah!

Easter Family Pictures 2013!!!

       Last Easter we had Dooders take some Easter pictures for us on Easter Sunday at Mema's house, and since he did such a great job AND since our family has changed SO MUCH since then we decided to have Mimmi and Dooders over for dinner on Easter Sunday and ask him to take Easter pictures for us once again! And once again, We LOVED them!! Can't wait to print them and switch out some of the pictures in frames and add these awesome shots!! Love my family with all of my heart and am so blessed to be a wife and a Mommy!! It's the Hardest, Best, Happiest, Toughest, Most Satisfying and Rewarding job I have ever and will ever have and I am grateful for that!!

 



 

In Our True Character!

 

And then we all knelt down!

 



 

Love Love Love Times Like these!

And wouldn't trade moments like these for anything!

 



 

These girls are SO PROTECTIVE over their little brother!

Best of Friends, and Sometimes Worst of Enemies, but truly love each other no matter what!

 

Ahhh, the Cheese is killin' me!

We sure love our little buddy too!

As something stage right catches his eye!

 



And then it is time to MOVE!

 Too Much Handsome in One Picture!

 

 

Almost 8 years since we met and I love him more than I can possibly express!!!

 

 



And of course this is the "Rest of the Story" that began on April 14, 2005 with a simple e-"flirt":)

Easter Egg Hunt 2013 and MORE!!!!

     Sometimes blogging is easier to find time for and other times not so much! But needless to say, Easter 2013 did come and go this year!! And we are happy to have some great photos to remind us of the happy times we had! We started our Easter Weekend on Saturday at High Noon with a yummy lunch at Mimmi and Dooders house. Followed by the highly anticipated, heavily talked about Annual Easter Egg Hunt!

      This year there were TWO Hunts! The first one was held for all those ages 0-10 and the eggs were filled with candy and numbers that coincided with prizes that were awarded once both of the hunts had ended!

     Each of the kiddos found TONS of eggs and everyone was really happy with the outcome, especially after they realized that the little slips of paper that had filled some of the eggs instead of candy, actually DID mean they won something Great, everything from toys, to gumballs, to chocolate bunnies in fact:)

     The adult hunt is a little more "SERIOUS", especially since these eggs are mainly filled with anything from .25 to $20!! Although ONCE AGAIN no one found the $20 egg!!! Having said that, Micah and I were the couple who actually found the most CASH this year, as we ended up with a grand total of $10.50! We were SUPER EXCITED seeing that usually our findings amount to less than $2:)

     Overall, our Easter Saturday was SUPER FUN and made even better by getting to spend a good part of it with family always tops it off!! Good Times were had and Lots of Great Pictures were Taken, just see for yourself!

 



 

Even though this isn't the best quality of photo, I LOVE it because it represents the FIRST day that Haley actually ENJOYED bonding with her Uncle Josh, usually she just gives him a really impressive "Stink Eye" whenever he is around!

The Studly Brown Brothers (Colton and Landon) in their Easter Best!!! 

Haley and Landon lost in conversation!

Ethan just arrived and was excited for a little "Dooders Time", despite the look on his face:)

The First Egg Hunt is about to Begin!

Only Missing Landon this time!! But Everyone Else was Ready to Run!! Except Ethan who was ready to learn how to run!

Haley searching the Tree!

She was having Great Luck with the Trees this year!

Happy with her next Find!

Despite the crazy face I am making, Ethan was EXCITED for his find too!





Gotta Love the "In the Flower Pot" Find!!

Cousins talking about all of their treasures, as Emily looks around for more eggs at the same time!

Haley was excited that her basket kept getting fuller and fuller!

Ethan and Dooders chillin' on the grass after The Hunt was over!

And while everyone else was wrapping up their Easter Gathering Chats, and saying their good byes these two cousins were chillin' together with their Easter Eggs!

The Dyeing of the Easter Eggs has Commenced!!!

     Today was THE DAY Folks!! Easter is ONLY 3 Days away so I thought, now is as good a time as any to DYE EASTER EGGS!! It's always been an activity I have looked forward to doing! And this year was no exception, although I will say that everyone woke up a bit too early this morning, and so I was SUPER happy that Ethan decided to go down for a morning nap right before we began!! Or else, this project could have been SOMETHING ELSE:)

      Anyway, the girls had a BLAST all the way from watching the eggs in the colored dye, to getting them out, to waiting for them to dry...okay so maybe that wasn't such a fun part! But they did THOROUGHLY enjoy our little photo shoot we took after the eggs were completed which included MANY different expressions:) And EVEN MORE they enjoyed the near 50 Easter Egg hunts we have done inside today since they eggs finished drying! Needless to say, we have now gone from 12 to about 3 eggs, but fun still outweighed the "egg loss":)

       All in all 2013 was another successful Easter Egg Dyeing Year at the Gray House!!!

 

 

Waiting for the Eggs to Change Color!!

 

Emily was more than happy to get the eggs out of the cups and Haley was equally as happy to hold the carton!!



The expression photos begin!!!    PROUD!!

HAPPY!

 

TOGETHERNESS!

SILLINESS!!!

SCARED!

LOVE!

SADNESS!



MADNESS!

 



PRIDE!

HUNGER!!

CUTENESS!

"ROOOOAR!! "Lion ness!!"

Pure and Utter SILLINESS!

And last, but certainly NOT least, SHARING!

To Grandpa Gray's We Go!

      It seems like FOREVER since we have gotten ourselves together enough to be able to make a trip down to Southern Virginia to visit with Grandpa Gray!! FINALLY Micah and I decided it had been FAR TOO LONG so we loaded up the van last Saturday morning and headed down!!

      It is about a  2 and a half hour trip each way, but overall the kiddos did really great with the traveling! The girls had their travel bags with snacks and activities to keep them busy and Ethan enjoyed being able to nap whenever he wanted to:)

      We had a really nice visit with Grandpa Gray! He treated us to lunch at our favorite restaurant down there, Hale's, the food is always so yummy!! Down home good cookin!!! Love it!! Then we came back and let the kiddos explore his apartments a little more while we chatted and then we were off!!

       We wanted to do something with the kids so that they could get some energy out and since it was such a pretty day, we didn't want to waste it! We decided to check out Dixie Caverns which is not too far from Grandpa's house at all. Although it was DEFINITELY a memorable trip, the lesson that we learned was DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES TAKE CHILDREN TO CAVERNS UNTIL THEY ARE VERY PROFICIENT AT WALKING ON THEIR OWN!  It was a very trying trip as Micah and I had to switch off with Ethan the entire time and of course the fact that the tour guide told us that we would be climbing (either up or down) approximately 400 steps during the tour, should have been a sign for us to turn around right there, but it wasn't and we completed the tour!!!

        It was cool however, and we got to see tiny bats that were hibernating, lots of stalactites and stalagmites, water, we even got to touch some formations that felt like clay!! Perhaps the craziest thing to me was that people actually get MARRIED down there!! They had one spot that was a wedding bell, CRAZY!!!!

      Anyway, overall great trip, and hopefully we won't let it be so long before coming back, to Grandpa's house that is, NOT the caverns!!

 



 

 Our 3 Musketeers on Grandpa's Chair!

 An Adorable Family Shot!

 Micah and Grandpa!

 Our Little Cowgirl!

 The Girls were fascinated with Grandpa's Hats!! So they were excited to have their picture taken!

 And Ethan was fascinated with the Sweeper!

Living Proof that we SURVIVED the caverns!! By a small stream where we got to throw rocks!