Frances Heart Day 2013

Frances Heart Day is an anniversary that we have decided to celebrate and it conveniently falls 6 months after her birthday. You see, she was born with a heart defect that would need surgical intervention. The idea was for her to get as big and strong as possible before the procedure. Her rate of growth began to plateau so we went ahead and had it performed at age 6 months. 

http://mccalleyfamily.blogspot.com/2011/08/our-little-superstar.html

Today marks two years since that procedure and we cannot stop celebrating how well she has done since then. Frances and Daddy decided to kick the day off at the Farmer's Market at Pepper Place. This was Frances first time to that event and it looks like we will be going to many more in the future. Among the dozens of people who commented on her New Balance shoes, we ran into a few friends and made some new ones.

Hi, Emily!

A new friend offered to take a picture of Emily, Frances and Daddy.

This girl LOVES music!

It started to get warm at Pepper Place so we took our morning workout to Brookwood Mall...

... and ran into some more friends.

Pictured here is a very cute, content Frances polishing off her Chik-Fil-A lunch.  The scene that follows after finishing her meal is not pleasant and is not worth photographing... until later.

Of all days, while Frances and Daddy spent the afternoon napping and relaxing at home, Momma ran into the nurse that took care of Frances while she was recovering from her heart surgery two years ago. Thank you again, Wayne!

After an afternoon of relaxing, our appetites were back up again for an evening with Aunt Amy, Meme and Grump at one of Frances' favorite restaurants, Mugshots.

Loving the cheerios appetizers.

My burger was GREAT!

Blowing out the candle on the cupcake.

Mommy teaching Frances to eat the icing and give the cake to Daddy.

This is the face I warned you about: The face that says 'the meal is over'. I think she gets it from me.

Walking off the meal. 

I can't believe the surgery was two years ago and it really couldn't have gone any better. I also know how fortunate my family is and I thank God for that every day.

Just Beachy

We have just returned from a really great beach trip with (almost all!) the fam.  We really missed Lyndy, but she wanted to go to camp, and she had fun.  It was WILD having 4 toddlers! The triplets were not huge fans of the sand at first, but they all did great.  By the end of the week Anna and Brooks were beach pros....Irene preferred lounging in her baby pool.  All the babies love Kat, who was such a good older cousin to play and entertain.

Will was quite a sport, letting Kat and Fran (and Nathan) bury him up to his face!

Big girl swimming in the ocean!

Beautiful view of the lagoon where we had fun watching the boats.

Sage and I went down early every morning (coffee in hand), before the babies were awake, to set up "camp" for the day.  It was pretty much our own version of an Irontribe workout.  We had quite a system, and I think so of the other vacationers enjoyed watching us every morning. The ticket to happy babies on the beach = snacks, and lots of them.

Frances absolutely LOVES the beach, and you may remember from previous trips that she eats sand constantly.  That hasn't changed.  The main consequence from eating sand is then pooping it out for a week afterwards, which isn't too enjoyable for anyone.  I don't even try to stop her anymore. She had so much fun crawling around, playing in the sand, playing with her cousins, swimming, and watching the people!

So glad Uncle Richard came!

The girls are on the go!

We never even attempted a "nice" picture of all of them together.

Fun dinner at The Gulf

Yep, that would be the BIG shark we saw on the last day!

Meat Fest 2013

Here are just a few photos of our Fourth of July celebration....our family calls it Meat Fest.  We went all out this year and even had t-shirts made.  We didn't let the rain spoil our fun (or all the beautiful decorations from Party City).  It was so fun to have the entire family here this year, and now we are all getting ready to head to the beach!

Anna, Frances, Brook, Irene 

Meme with all the girls!

Walking Walking

Frances is working hard on walking this summer, and we are seeing her taking a few steps by herself every once in a while.  The mall is a fantastic place to go walking, especially on Sundays before the stores open.  Wide open space, smooth floors, and not a lot to crash into- it's perfect! This morning we went mall walking, did a little window shopping, and played in the book store.