Catch Up, Reprise

A while back, Grandmother sent the girls a box full of goodies, including costumes, puzzles, popcorn, and 3 pairs of these adorable striped tights for dress-up. They spent all afternoon "skating" on the hardwood in the tights, and working the puzzle, over and over, playing and sharing like angels. Some things just don't happen everyday, so I had to snap some pics! ;)

Aunt Joey sent the girls (among other things) a *huge* jar of art supplies for Christmas. Natalie followed me around the house for days holding the jar and saying, "Mom, can we do art supplies? PLEEEEEEEEASE?!" So I finally let them dig in and they had a ball. Natalie usurped both giant fluff balls (which reminded me of Warm Fuzzies when I was in Kindergarten) right from the start, but Madeline didn't seem to mind. Notice her lower lip, puckered in deep concentration, as she tries to squeeze glitter glue onto a button above.
Natalie positioned the glider in front of the TV to watch a movie, and fell fast asleep in this pose. I had to take a picture - but looking at it makes my head hurt! Can you imagine sleeping upside down?! My brain cells are screaming just thinking about it.

Jesse and I saw "I Am Legend" tonight - not bad. We were a little miffed though, that the movie was listed by the theater as having a run-time of 2:10, but 30 of that was commercials and previews. The movie started at 7:00, but the MOVIE didn't start until 7:30, and we were back in the truck on the way home by 9:00. We liked the movie but we wished they'd developed it a little more, maybe done something more with the ending. I mean, Pirates of the Caribbean was 3 hours long, for Pete's sake! Overall though, it was a good movie, if somewhat disturbing. I used to love End-of-the-World thrillers before I had children. Now my stomach does herkies during them, because all I can think about is our girls in a scenario like that. Makes me wish for World Peace. Or want to learn my way around an assault rifle.

The Great Cupcake

Jesse took Big Ben out on his fishing boat the other day. Before they left, Jesse put Ben in one of his long-sleeve thermal shirts, and then a Steeler jersey on top of that. The big weenie was still cold, so by the time they got home, he had him bundled up in his work jacket. Jesse said he was shivering, but then when he put him in the jacket he stopped and started trotting around the boat woofing at birds onshore. Hilarious. He really seemed to enjoy the coat, which is *super* soft and warm. Perfect for a Giant Cupcake.

Miami on my mind

Looks like Jesse is really starting to prepare himself mentally for living in Miami.

Jesse's Fishing Trip

Jesse spent the day on the lake fishing with a guy who grew up around here. This is his catch! That big guy was about 7 pounds. We kept trying to get the girls to stand next to him for scale, but Madeline was a little scared of him - he was huge!

Slow dancing, swaying to the music...

Their evening of slow dancing ended abruptly when Ben made an inappropriate grab for Jesse's rear. Love is in the air...

Had him at the vet last week, and he was around 140 lbs.

Halloween

We have this *massive* local church, Cartersville First Baptist I think with about a zillion members. It's really close to our house so I took the girls to their Fall Festival and it was SOOO nice. I loved it because I knew they were surrounded with (comparatively) safe people, and they had so much for them to do. The minute we got there they handed them glow-necklaces and a goody bag, and then we headed straight for the bounce house, which they had all to themselves for like 10 minutes. Then the giant inflatable slide, which was like a clown car of kids, they were trying so hard to keep them in line but it was a total melee, arms and legs sticking out everywhere. Natalie hesitated a little (and I had to teach her the concept of standing in line) but then she went for it. And the surprise of the night, Madeline saw Baby do it once, and jumped right in behind her. Much older kids everywhere, and she just got in line, threw elbows when she needed to, climbed the ladder by herself (she didn't even look at me!!) and only hesitated for a sec at the top, then Cowabunga!! Down she came, with eyes the size of dinner plates, and I won't lie, she wasn't smiling, but she did it. Then it was off to pet the animals, they had a petting zoo!! I couldn't get any pics of that, but there was a pot belly piggy (I've discovered the world's softest nose, sorry Ben) an alpaca (sp?), baby goats, and a horse in full saddle with a guy in boots and a hat riding him, (which they must have hired from Dorky Cowboys R Us, you had to be there, I was just waiting for him to call me 'Mam.)

So then we "Trunk or Treated" and that was so much fun, everyone had their trunks decorated in different themes, and some of them were so clever. They got loads of candy, and then they had their faces painted. By that time it was dark and getting cold, (and I told them they couldn't eat any candy until we got home and I could look it over) so we "cracked" their glow necklaces, and they came around with glow bracelets too, and those were so much fun through the dark parking lot (which has to be 6 acres, this is a huge church) and in the car on the way home, I might add. They slept with their glow necklaces as "night lights," they love those things. I was really impressed by the Fall Festival, we will definitely do that again.

Natalie's Birthday

More than a little late, I know, but better late than never. I actually have some time so I'm playing blog catch-up today, maybe I should make that this blog's title, playing catch-up. Anyway, Natalie turned 5 on October 1st (FIVE, YEARS, MAN!!)


She didn't know she was getting a "Mommy make me better" baby doll she had seen in a commercial. She asked for it every time she saw the commercial, and I played it cool. Mom found it and sent it, so I didn't even have to figure out a way to buy it for her and hide it (try that when she's in the shopping cart with you. May have worked when she was 2, but not anymore.) Anyway, this was the look on her face when she realized what she was opening.


She had to use scissors to open everything, because she's a big kid now, we were curtly informed, and basically letting her use scissors is akin to letting you or I drive the Space Shuttle.


I loved the reaction from Madeline when she opened this puzzle. She *loves* puzzles and she reacted with her whole body, "OOOOOHHHHH!"


Jesse had all sorts of little things for both girls after Natalie opened her big presents, things like nail polish (I made that disappear post haste) markers, and new princess cups with straws. He made them close their eyes between each little surprise, but Madeline never quite got the "wait til I say open 'em part.) She would close her eyes for just a sec, then totally peek, then yell out the next surprise, while Natalie obediently has her eyes covered waiting for Jesse to say open 'em. It was so cute.


Here's her cake. It was an ice cream cake from DQ, and the *WHOLE THING* was made from ice cream. I thought it would have a "cake layer" you know? The writing on top was supposed to be purple? But we let Natalie put the princess candle and the little pink candles on, and she had a blast. And the cake was *so good.*

A frog!

I'm sure you all remember that Baby's nickname when she was, er, a baby, was "Frog." Please to enjoy the following...We have these little sticky-toed frogs all over our house because of the bugs that the window candles draw. It's like a smorgasboard for them, and so at night you can see them walking and hopping along on the windows from the inside. In the morning, this little guy was sitting out in plain sight. My guess is that he has learned a valuable lesson.Rooney was more interested in blowing bubbles.We released him back into the wild :) Actually baby threw him in the pond, and the goldfish tried to eat him, so he jumped out. I don't think we'll be seeing Mr. Froggy back on the porch for a while, and he probably didn't have anything nice to say about his stay with us to his little sticky-toed buddies, either.

Still Catching Up

Procrastinating questions on theistic evolution, actually. I would much rather be creating a new diaper cake I have in mind!! But I have school work that has to get done at some point, and the girls are in bed, so it's about as quiet as it gets around here. But do I go to the computer and just get my school work done?! NoooooOOOOOOoooooo, I put laundry in, take laundry out and fold it, put dishes away, reload dishwasher, threaten dog with his life if he doesn't stop barking at nothing, straighten the perpetually disheveled sofa and living room, check email, (at one point, I did open my textbook,) take second load of laundry out and fold it, wipe down bathroom floor (it had baby soap squirted on it,) put another load of clothes in, and start dishwasher. Still not able to concentrate on school, so I spend half an hour promoting the website. Then I check the blog to see if anyone's commented on the pictures I posted *last* night when I was procrastinating school. No luck. Not that I blame anyone, since it's been a coon's age since I put new pictures up. But since I was here....after this I will get my work done. Honest engine. Unless the clothes are dry....Jesse got this massive inflatable water slide for the girls and set it up the same day we were working on the pond and the new landscaping. Natalie must have gone up and down that thing 700 times. She was unstoppable, laughing her butt off the whole time. We did not get Rooney to slide even once. Not once. In fact, when I tried to carry her up at one point and just slide her down, she went into convulsive nuclear meltdown, and so I decided to leave well enough *the hell alone*. If she was perfectly content to stand at the bottom of the slide and watch Baby come down, cracking up hysterically every time, then hunky dory. The only reason she's even wet in these pics is from Natalie's splashes. Big Ben was close by keeping a watchful eye on all the fun, taking the occasional drink from the slide, and barking at the splashes Natalie made at the bottom. Notice his black nose in the picture. I think he wanted a turn.

A good time was had by all, and Natalie was asleep before she even got near the pillow. Out like disco, and slept like a rock. We have to get that slide out again before the weather starts to cool off. You know, in January.

Playing catch-up

All right folks, as many of you know, I am up to my eyeballs with school, the baby shower gifts business, and two little girls. And one enormous dog. I know you are a sweet bunch of people, but the truth is you don't really want to see pictures of diaper cakes, but pictures of the girls. Right? And I have really dropped the ball lately! So here you go, our entire Summer in ten pictures or less!! I know you are in no danger of forgetting where to go if you need an adorable and unique baby shower gift, right? Good. Just checking.We re-did the pond, and Jesse put in some new landscaping to cover the barren wasteland that was up against the rock garden. The people who owned the house before us had let the leaves pile up for years, and they had smothered the grass. Looks much better in person, I had a hard time finding a good spot to stand in to get a picture without a hickory tree right in the middle of it.

Look at BabyBug's face. Priceless.

We spent a week in Wilmington at Jim & Sharon's, and Jamie and Bill were there with their daughters too. Natalie and Madeline had an absolute blast at the beach. All Rooney wanted to do was play in the water, which surprised me, because Natalie is usually the fearless one, Madeline, the more cautious. I hadn't figured out at the time how to get my camera to take more than 7 pictures, or I would have taken more. I wish I had gotten a few of the girls with Jamie and Bill. Phooey.

Every time I photograph a new diaper cake, Baby Bug appears almost instantaneously on the scene, conveniently dressed up like a princess, and wants her picture taken too. In about 90% of the pictures on the website, there is a tiny princess lurking just barely off-camera, and I can't tell you how many diaper cake pictures I've had to delete because the tiny princess pirouetted through the picture.

Matching outfits, courtesy of Grammy. I took about a dozen pictures, and I'm tempted to post them all, so you can all laugh at the faces the girls made while I tried everything to convince them to stand still and say cheese. They were having none of it, but I did the best I could!