Father-Daughter

He's our hero, so this week we celebrated Father-Daughter fun.






Avery's special night was a Father-Daughter Dance with her elementary school.  There were horse rides, face painting, dancing, and lots of Mardi Gras masks.  Avery kept a countdown going all week of how many days until the dance, and then on the day of the dance, she'd ask: "Mom, how many more hours until we can get ready?"  She asked every 10 minutes, just to be sure she didn't miss it.

My special night was Dad's Night at school.  We  made trail mix for our Daddies and practiced some Texas songs.  I was pretty nervous because I couldn't remember the words to the songs all by myself, but it worked out and I did great when the whole class was singing along.  I also filled out a special question page about my Daddy and he had to guess which one was the page I wrote about him.  He said the thing that gave it away was "My favorite thing to do with Daddy is go to Katy Mills Mall."  But other clues were just as helpful, if you ask me: "My Daddy is 20 years old", and "for his work, my Daddy plays music."  Afterwards, he took me to get ice cream to make the night extra special.

One day, Reese will have her turn to have a Daddy date too.  He's a lucky man with four lovely ladies to date!

Click here for pictures

Love, Kate Daddy's Girl McClinton

Valentine's Love

Valentine's is a time to celebrate people we love.  So, we did that.

We celebrated with our playgroups, with our school friends, with Nana and D, and finally, at the end of another week of travel, with our Daddy.

On Valentine's, Mom asked us what we would like to make the day special, since Daddy wasn't home and we had no major plans.  Avery picked bath bombs and a long, hot soak in the tub.  I picked ice cream.  Reese picked "mah" (more) candy, and Mom picked C.O.F.F.E.E.

It was a good day to celebrate love!

Click here for pictures

Love, Kate

Sea World or Bust

So, we had season tickets to Sea World that we got last Spring Break.  We wanted to use them before they expired, so we hoped on priceline and bid for a hotel at a ridiculously low price - after all, the point of the weekend was FREE entry - and then headed out to Sea World.

The potential for it to be a bad weekend was ripe: 45 minutes of a screaming baby on the way up (she woke up from her nap too early and was not happy to be pinned in the car), sisters who yelled at the baby to stop yelling, a smoking room in a fairly low-end joint, one king size bed for all 5 McClintons, and a rainy, drizzly, cold day at the park.

But you know what I love about my husband? We just decided it was going to be a good weekend because we were together and were able to genuinely have a great time.

So the baby screamed on the way up.  A stop at Buc-ees and some fresh air solved the problem.  So the room was gross and stinky... the girls never complained, loved cuddling and watching tv, and it was only for one night, after all.

And the rain and the cold?  It guaranteed that the dolphins were feeling frisky and that there were almost no crowds.  We got to do everything we had hoped to do with no crowds.  Pretty awesome.

Avery fed the dolphins but said her favorite part was the shows (all of them!), Kate said hers was the penguins (which we went through three times), and Reese loved all of the "ish", most especially Shamu.  She kept asking me for "more!" every time Shamu jumped.  Mama and Daddy both agreed: the dolphins in the feeding/touching tank were the favorite for them.  Such a good weekend together, despite the occasional unfortunate circumstance.

Click here for pictures of the week

Beautiful

The weather has been absolutely beautiful.

The girls are beautiful.

God's creation is beautiful.

We are feasting in the beauty around us this week!

Psalm 19:1
"The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims His handiwork."

Click here for pictures of the week