Our Beautifully Blessed Life ~ Cruising through Life with the Collins Family: Love is in the Air....

My camera currently has 516 pictures on the memory card...I take way too many pictures.

But, I want to have these pictures when I am 70 years old, to look back and remember these fun family times, so I will never apologize for taking so many. Perhaps when we have the need to build on a room to house my photo albums, I will consider apologizing...or not. With all that being said, Harrison has 14 albums from his life thus far, each holding 300 photos each. Hayden, at this point, has one album, and MANY photos waiting to find their spot in her albums...and many more waiting to even find their way to the printer.

February has been a fun month for us. We finally made it out into the snow as a family. It was melting by the time we accomplished this, but of course it had to be a family affair, complete with video footage of Hayden's first snow, and of course pictures. So without further adeu, I present you with pictures from the day. She of course didn't get into it too much, didn't want to touch it, and silly me forgot until after the fact that I had bought a baby sled at a garage sale this summer. So, I'm hoping for a little more snow so that we can use it. Don't you think she'd old enoughtopulled behind the 4-wheeler.....just kidding!

Hayden just turned 10 months old on the 12th, and I can't believe it! She is crawling everywhere and getting into everything. She is opening cabinet doors and drawers and disrupting my laundry folding! As a matter of fact, as I type this, she is at my feet going through the trash can....eating candy wrappers! ( I don't have any idea who sits at the computer and eats candy...) She is pulling up to furniture and I'm afraid soon we will have to get out the baby gates because she will be eyeing the stairs soon I'm sure.

Harrison is busy continuing to be a good big brother. He tries very hard to watch out for her. He is my little watchdog, telling me when she puts something in her mouth, even occassionally wrestling with her and risking his fingers being bitten off to retrieve whatever she has attempted to eat. He was sick and missed 4 days of school recently with strep throat, but he is almost back to his normal self. Our biggest challenge in the "brother department" remains leaving Hayden alone when she is happy. He is pure boy, and along with that, he is challenging us at times (not saying that girls aren't challenging....) I pray for patience as I try to teach him right from wrong and to THINK!! before he does things. He is playing basketball, and is extremely competative. So, we are working on good sportsmanship, and sometimes I feel like I am "preaching" until I am blue in the face. But, he IS a good boy with a compassionate heart. He is enjoying his Club 252 at church and is learning lots of praise and worship songs that I love to hear him singing on his own! He and Aaron just finished up their waterfowl hunting season and Harrison is hoping that next year he won't have to be just a spectator! I am hoping that with the end of hunting seasons, my mudroom will once again not literally be a mudroom!

And back to Hayden.... well, she is just busy being cute! Have I mentioned that I love having a little girl? I always said that if my first child was a boy, I felt I'd have all boys (3 of them, in fact). I am glad I was wrong!

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Ahh...the romance!

For Valentines Day we went to That Fun Place, which is like a Chuck E Cheese. We had a coupon from when Hayden was born, so it was super-duper cheap, as in all we had to pay for was our tokens. We had pizza, played games, bumper cars, and Harrison played Lazer tag. The night together was fun. Hayden liked watching all the bright lights and cheered me on playing SkeeBall and Deal or No Deal! I don't normally do much for Valentines Day, in the past just something small for Harrison, but I must admit, the thought of buying my little girls first Valentine got the best of me, so they both came away with a surprise from Mommy and Daddy!We came home with a ceramic lizard, a whistle, and a plastic sheriffs' badge and lots of smiles!