Police, Picnic and a tooth

What would Mother's Day really be without some involvement with the Police? Yesterday, as we were enjoying the gale force winds in the backyard, we hear this extremely loud, sudden CRASH. Steven, whose employee-owned truck sat parked on the street, calmly said, "I bet somebody just backed in to the truck." And that is exactly what happened! The neighbor across the street backed in to the parked truck! We couldn't pass up the opportunity to take Elle's picture by the police car.

It really was a nice weekend and my husband gave me lots of breaks from my usual "mother" duties. He and Elle made breakfast and coffee, delivered with a sweet card and a gift certificate to a spa. We went out to a park for a picnic lunch, and with the exception of the 80 mph winds, had a nice time.



Grady's Mother's Day gift was his first tooth breaking through the gums, which translates in to a lot of crankiness, fussiness and night wakings?! Actually, he was awake a good bit Friday night but slept through Saturday night. And compared to Elle's first teeth, he's been a breeze. If it weren't for these two, I wouldn't have had such a fun two days of extra love and appreciation! I am extremely grateful for the privelege of being a mother, especially to the two miracles God has given me.

Puddles

Earlier in the week, I bought Elle some rain boots for singing, dancing and splashing in the rain. We went with the green frogs so both sister AND brother get to enjoy the rain and puddles. She had so much fun until she was soaked through. We literally poured water out of her boots!

Ideas?

In my efforts to reduce, reuse and recycle, I have saved all of the baby food jars from Grady's journey to solid foods. Does anyone have any creative ideas of what I could do with them?

I also wanted to try to use some cloth diapers to reduce some of my disposable diaper waste and wanted to know if anyone knew of a good brand to try.

I did purchase five reusable shopping bags from Wal-Mart and have felt so good each time I shop and come home with zero plastic bags. If you haven't done this yet, I encourage you to do so. Every little bit can help!

What does it mean?

What does it mean when you're trying to begin to get your abs back in shape after carrying and birthing two babies in 3 years and as you start doing sit-ups, your 8 month old begins to laugh like he's never laughed before?


What does it mean when your almost 3 year old daughter says, "Mom, your house is dirty."? I guess it means it's pretty funny to see me doing exercise and my house is dirty.

Have A Nice Day

I wanted to write a little about our trip to Atlanta this past weekend, but here we are, four days later and I can't seem to get to it. We had a wonderful time, starting with the Bon Jovi concert on Thursday night at the Philips Arena. On Friday, we went to the Center for Puppetry Arts to see a performance of Cinderella Della Circus. Saturday we visited the Georgia Aquarium and the New World of Coca-Cola musuem. We decided to check out the children's museum, Imagine It!, on Sunday before heading home. And throughout the stay, we spent several hours at Centennial Park on the playgrounds and debating the fountains. Elle's favorite thing about the entire trip: "Skittles!"








The best part was that everything (except the puppet show) borders Centennial Park. We were able to walk to all of these attractions, and very short distances too. It was an extremely fun, entertaining, and educational mini-vacation for us all. Thanks to Mom, Madison, Steph, BA, Rhonda & Luke for making it so special!

Almost 25 years ago

My friend Tara (who has been my friend since Kindergarten) tagged me to do this, so here's my fives. I also added our kindergarten picture for your viewing pleasure. That's me on the front row, on the right end. Tara is the second from the left on the front row. We do have on matching white knee socks. I'm sure we planned it:).

Five Things on my TO DO List:

1. Iron. This is a never ending battle for me. It is my LEAST favorite household chore. I think if I had a place where I could leave the ironing board out at all times, this would be better. However, the spot of choice for ironing is our bedroom, which means the board should get put away after each use.
2. Make a bench cushion. I just got some fabric and foam while in Dothan to make a cushion for a bench in our garage. I’m trying to get some good use out of my sewing machine.
3. Go through the kids’ clothes. I need to go put up/give away all the ones they’ve grown out of and make room for new stuff. I keep thinking they have clothes because their closets are full, but most of it is too small?!
4. Redo our bedroom. We just decided to do this and are in the process of trying to pick out new bedding, fabrics, paint color, etc. Most of our walls are still that drab khaki/grey color and I am in need of a little color in my life. I will probably be using le ‘ole sewing machine on this project too.
5. EXERCISE. I’ve lost all of my Grady weight, but could use quite a bit of “toning”. If I could just get back in to the swing of running and if only it didn’t have to be at 6 AM….

Five Favorite Snacks:

1. Pretzels and Chocolate Chips
2. Chocolate Chip cookies
3. Fresh Fruit (but I don’t like the washing, peeling, cutting, etc. that sometimes goes with it)
4. Ice cold Root Beer in a bottle (this is about a once a month treat)
5. Popcorn and M&M’s (thanks to my friend Nikki)

Five things I would do if I were a Billionaire:

1. Pay off our debt and lots of other peoples’ debt.
2. Build my dream house on lots of land
3. And have a house at the beach
4. Travel (Hawaii, Africa, Europe, to name a few!)
5. Buy my husband whatever kind of car he wanted

Five Bad Habits:

1. I bit my fingernails until I was 22 years old and started nursing school. Technically, no longer a bad habit, but it’s one of the classics so I had to list it.
2. If my hair is down, I will twirl it, tie it in knots, or do little braids.
3. I’m not very good at calling people back. I’m not much of a phone person.
4. Sometimes I don’t finish sentences or thoughts when talking to people (especially Steven and this seems to be very irritating :).
5. I start a lot of things without finishing them. That's why I have a few different stacks of "projects" in the bedroom, on the bar, in the closets... you get the idea.

Five Places I Have lived:

1. Born in Birmingham, AL but lived in Dothan, AL for 17 years
2. Bamberg, Germany (lived there for 6 months in 7th grade with my mom & brother)
3. Troy, AL (4 years for college, small break to Daphne, AL for 4 months then 3 more years in Troy)
4. Almaty, Kazakhstan (10 months teaching English at a university)
5. Birmingham, AL (3 years and counting… technically I live 20 minutes south of Birmingham, but it’s close enough to say Birmingham and nobody knows my little town anyway!)

Five Jobs I’ve Had:

1. Teller at Southtrust Bank in Troy through college (5 years)
2. MAID at the Four Points Sheraton hotel in Panama City Beach, FL during a Summer Beach Project with Campus Outreach (2 months, thankfully!)
3. RN on the Med/Surg floor at Edge Regional Medical Center in Troy, AL (6 months—we moved to B’ham)
4. RN with an OB/Gyn office in Birmingham, AL (4 months--we left for Kazakhstan)
5. Stay-at-home mom for 3 years!


I thought I would end it with our second grade picture. I'll let you decide who's who. This was quite a second grade class!

For you Days Fans

I will confess I did watch Days of Our Lives while in college. I even admit to scheduling classes around the show a time or two. And while I don't watch it now, I can bet the same things are still going on 10 years later. But this is for those of you who do still watch--and I know there are some of you out there! Commander Abe (I can't remember his real name?!) came to my mother's school to read to the kids in March when I happened to be at her house. Unfortunately, I did not pack up my two small children, forgo naptimes and drive 45 minutes one way to see him. The autographed picture and photo of him and my mom was enough for me. Hope you faithful viewers are impressed.

Happy Earth Day! I will save my Earth Day post for tomorrow... or the next day.