Jennifer came in a few weeks ago for her maternity session.  Can you believe that this is her THIRD pregnancy?!  This woman is Gorgeous!  And she was literally just about to deliver at this point.  I think Baby Matthew was born the next week.  I remember feeling nothing but hot, uncomfortable and swollen at this point in my pregnancies, but Jennifer was glowing!

And then just a little while later, we got to meet Baby Matthew!  Oh My Goodness, this is one SWEET boy!  Jennifer said he was super teeny compared to her other boys, but he still had some pretty great rolls.  He was squishy and super lovable, and I had so much fun snuggling with him.  Welcome to the world, Baby Matthew!

Despite the rain, we had a great time at Stone Mountain.  After leaving the American Girl Store we headed back to the campground to change and ride that cable car thing up the mountain.  That thing’s kinda scary.  But we made it and had fun on the giant rock. =)

Miss CB, high on American Girl, brought the doll with her up the mountain and kept wanting to pose with her.  Cutie.

Mak did his best to avoid the camera and had fun giving me minor heart attacks by getting too close to the edge.  Stinker. =)

And he took this photo of his Momma and Daddy.  I think he did a great job!

My new year’s resolution this year was more photos of all four of us together.  Not portraits necessarily, just photos of the four of us.  We did a pretty good job of that this trip!

We  wandered down the mountain a little while longer and someone decided that she might not make it back to the top.

Her brother laughed at her. =)

Collin had fun with the camera…I LOVE this first one especially!

And, finally, after some encouragement from Daddy {and the promise of a Sprite at the end} Miss CB made it back up the hill.

Stone Mountain was fun and I definitely want to head back and do some of the activities that we missed due to rain.  From here we headed back to the campground for our last night.

When it was raining on Sunday we fled the campground to Walmart in search of a new game to help us keep our sanity.  We came home with Hedbanz and the kids loved it so much that they still wanted to play, even after the rain stopped.  It is pretty funny.

He kept telling me “I won’t fall in, I won’t fall in!”  He totally fell in (just one leg). =)

More family pics!

We had a perfect campfire that night, slept well, and were lazy about packing up on Tuesday morning.

Gracious, I love those two.  So there you have it.  Clara Beth’s soggy sixth birthday trip.  We had a great time and, most importantly, the Birthday Girl got the trip she requested. =)

We didn’t even pull the camera out until Monday morning when we hit up the American Girl store.  There was NO containing Miss CB’s excitement.  And I’m not gonna lie, I was pretty excited too.

I have to stop for a minute and brag on my sister-in-law, Rebecca.  See those dresses?  She MADE them.  I can’t sew a button on a shirt, so talent like this amazes me.  We had this one woman following us all over the store staring CB down trying to get a better look at the dresses.  Finally she stopped me and asked where the dresses were from and said she’d never seen anything like them.  She’s right.  CB and I love them SO much.  Thank you, Rebecca!

Finally the doors opened and we were invited in.  We were the only ones in the store for about twenty minutes and even by the time we left there were only about four other groups there.  I definitely recommend going on a weekday while school is still in session!

It was a little creepy, the amount of dolls in such a small space.

How was Mak during all of this, you ask?  Um, pretty much hating life.

He spent his time dodging the camera…

lounging on the bench…

Asking how much longer…

Climbing the bench…

And then he found something that looked kinda promising.  One of those dolls had her own campfire!

He really was a good sport, though.  He loves his sister. =)  Before long it was time for our Bistro reservation, but we had to make a stop at the ladies’ room.  Oh my Stars, y’all they have a place for the dolls in the bathroom.  Craziness.

We did the whole Birthday Celebration thing and it was a lot of fun. You never know how these things are going to turn out, but the food was great and Clara Beth had a lot of fun!

Birthday cake time!!  Everything was so girly and cute!

I love that face!!!

This was the part of the day that he got into.

She received a goody bag filled with things for her doll and she was SO HAPPY.

We left the store and saw something we hadn’t seen in days…SUNSHINE!!  I was going to go ahead and blog the rest of the trip but this post is already obnoxiously long so I’ll save that for another day.  I will say, though, that this was fun.  Definitely the highlight of the trip for our Birthday Girl!  If you’re considering a trip, do it!  You’ll be your little girl’s hero. =)

Now let me give you a little bit of background information.  The kids and I have home-schooled with this family this year.  We have attended co-op together every Thursday morning, and while I never had the chance to be in any classes with their kids or Teena, Clara Beth was in a science class with Titus and Teena.  And ever since Christmas I’ve watched every Thursday as Teena’s belly got more and more Fabulous.  Seriously, this woman has the BEST pregnant belly EVER!  How Gorgeous is she?!  A few weeks ago Teena noticed that Jude just wasn’t right.  He wasn’t acting like his normal self and he didn’t feel good.  I do not know all of the specifics, but I do know that through a series of doctors visits, Jude was diagnosed with leukemia.  They spent a lot of time in Columbia and continue to travel back and forth for treatments.  It’s so clear that God has His hand all over this entire situation by many little things that are coming together.  One big thing, though, is that sweet little baby sister that is about to be born.  I don’t understand the whole cord blood thing and how it works to help kids who are sick, but I do know that this little girl is getting ready to help her brother in a big way.  There are a million more things I could tell you about this family, but for now let me just tell you this.  Jude is an AMAZING little guy.  He’s funny and sweet and he LOVES his Mom and Dad and big brother, Titus.  He has maybe the coolest hair in the world. =)  He likes to ride his bike and swing REALLY high and do the “underdog”.  He likes the BIG burritos at Chipolte, pepperoni pizza, eggs, and popcorn and right now due to steroids he’s eating like a 17 year old boy.  He is the sweetest thing.  Please continue to keep him in your prayers.

And I’ll close the blog post with the Bible verse that is attached to all of Teena’s emails:

“You keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on you because he trusts in you.” Isaiah 26:3

Poor Baby!  This one makes me laugh!

Sleep!!  Finally!

And here they are more recently at their Easter session…what Cuties!