A Stormy Day

This was how our day started...

Then we had a whole lot of storms in between. A tornado touch down a couple of streets over caused us to lose power for about an hour, but other than scaring the girls pretty well the rest of the day was not to bad. They spent some quality bonding time hiding together in our closet along with some carefully packed supplies. There were three flashlights, 5 blankets, several pillows, a bag of books, Nintendo DS, 6 toothbrushes, 2 tubes of toothpaste, 2 boxes of granola bars and 13 pair of pajamas. I seriously could not coax them out while it was thundering, thank goodness they were so prepared with all those jammies.

And then our night ended this way...

This doesn't look like the most comfy sleeping position does it? And with all those jammies on hand you would think she would put them to use...

It's Laughter Lives! Tuesday

This post is part of "Laughter Lives! Tuesday" on the Riggs Family Blog. Check our their blog to read everyone else's "Laughter Lives!" posts.

Last night as I was tucking the girls into bed Rylee, very seriously, said "Mama, I have a question."

I leaned over her and smoothed her hair back from her face and said "Okay, what is your question?"

"It's a portant question Mama, bery, BERY portant!" she states earnestly as she stares up at me. I wait for her to ask me her question, but she just stares back at me.

"What is it Rylee, what is your question?" I prod her gently, wondering what is going on in that little head of hers tonight.

"Wait a minute - wait Mama!" she says as she taps her forehead with her finger. "Just wait, I have to get my brains out first!"

I choked back the laughter and said "Your brains? Where are you getting them out from?"

She looked at me like I am a complete moron "Well they are BACK HERE (slapping the back of her head), you don't know that Mama? They are back here, and I have to get them and bring them up here (touching her forehead). Then I can ask you my bery portant question!"

"Okay, my brains are ready now... Mama... can you itchy my back?"

I stare at her for a moment "That is your very important question Rylee?"

She answers "Yes Mama - that is my portant question!"

iHeartFaces - Black and White Photo Entry

Wow, I just found this site last week and I have already learned so much - mostly that I know very little about how to take amazing pictures! There are some extremely talented photographers out there - and I am so excited that I get to learn from them. Check out the amazing talent by clicking here or go to http://www.iheartfaces.blogspot.com/. I only wish I had enough time to see all the photo entries!!!

This weeks theme is Black and White and I am entering the kids category.

The kids and I headed outside on Saturday to take a few pictures. Out of the hundred or so shots that I took, this was probably my favorite.

Reality vs. Fantasy

As Rylee's language develops and she is able to communicate her thoughts and ideas better, she is starting to ask more questions. Here are a few examples:

Rylee: "Mama, when we dream do we have bubbles over our heads?"

Me: "What do you mean Rylee?"

Rylee: "You know, like Hanna draw in picture with dog - do our dreams have words in bubbles when we sleep - do you see that Mama?"

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As we were watching Jon & Kate Plus 8 last night:

Rylee: "Mama, maybe when I am a person like you I will have a kid or six in my tummy!"

Suddenly her face lights up with excitement!

"MAMA - maybe my kid will be CHINESE! (clapping hands) OR maybe she will be 9 like Hanna!"

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At dinner last night:

Rylee: "Yummmm, Mama this is so good! When I am a person like you, I will make this for my kids. Maybe I will make this for my kids every day!"

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Rylee: "Mama, why the person in the TV not talkin to me? HEY YOU (yelling at television) you not nice - not talkin to me (rolls eyes)!"

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Rylee: "Mama, what's his name? (pointing to her dad)"

Me: "Do you mean Daddy?"

Rylee: "OH YEAH - I forgot (laughing hysterically)! You name is Daddy!!!!"

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iheartfaces - kids photo entry

I found this blog that holds a weekly photo contest and thought that I would give it a try. They have two categories - I of course am picking the kids category :)

Here is this weeks theme:

I think the photo I picked works perfectly for this theme because that is exactly what Rylee was filled with as she experienced her first ever dinner show! This was taken just over a year ago and she had only been home with us for about two months. She was amazed, delighted, awestruck, sometimes concerned and most definitely filled with wonder!

Laughter Lives Tuesday!

This post is part of "Laughter Lives! Tuesday" on the Riggs Family Blog. Check our their blog to read everyone else's "Laughter Lives!" posts.

You know those days when you just really feel like you are at the end of your rope? When you just can't take another minute of children bickering, whining or just plain being crabby?



And then you take a good look at the family dog and see that he too is at the end of his "rope" after being forced to be a miniature horse for far too long! You just can't help but take pity on him!







Well, I have the absolute best cure... really, it just doesn't get any better than this!!




Are you ready? REALLY ready? Okay then - brace yourself for what you are about to see:

THE CURE:

Peanut Butter: $0.50
Stress Relief: Priceless!!!!!!!!

Don't you want to play in the clouds too?

How cool is this? Play With Pictures is giving away 10,000 free trials of their new software. It only took a short tutorial and a little playing around and I came up with this - too fun!!! If you want to try, just click here.

Venturing into treacherous waters...

Okay, maybe that is a slight overreaction, but I need advise from other mothers of a 9 year old - or mothers of a previous 9 year old. Is this the age, could it really be here already - is this the time that the girls become - oh how I dread this - "boy crazy"?????????

I am torn here between panic over what is to come ( the sweet silliness and the broken hearts that can come with a first crush) and having a little bit of mommy pride because she did pick the most adorable boy in the third grade. She has known the OOHA (object of her affection) for almost a year, but recently when she talks about him she gets this shy, embarrassed, adorable little grin on her face. I have flashes of people that I know (of) that met their Prince Charming at a very young age and it starts to freak me out.

So if the Mother of the OOHA still checks in on my blog occasionally - please shoot me an email (click in the side bar) we need to strategize talk. Oh, and if you haven't been to my blog lately, you just might want to skip this fairly recent post. Really - no need to even go there! Do boys even talk about this stuff at home - maybe she doesn't even know what's brewing here!

Soooooo moving on. There is a boy at school that asked Hanna to take a special valentines card, and special chocolate to one of her friends, with specific instructions to not tell the girl who they were from until Monday. On Monday she is to tell the friend who the boy is and find out if she (the friend) likes him too. Seriously, third grade people? It just seems to me like these things started much later when I was younger... Mom - do you remember????????

As much as I would love to share a picture of OOHA with you - I just cannot do that to my child. She would be oh-so-embarassed so you will just have to trust me on the fact that he is quite the cutie!!!

Another Biggest Loser...

This is a little behind, but with all the "yuck" going on around here it's the soonest I could get to it. So Tuesday night - biggest loser night, we were all actually finally feeling pretty good. The girls and I went in to watch our show.

They get to this pop quiz where they have to balance on a block to win. People were falling off left and right - brown team right away - no surprise there right? Then Tara goofs around, falls off, takes a dive into the pool and then whines about ruining her sneakers in the pool - could she seriously not see this coming??? They haven't even been on these blocks - what more than 5 minutes at this point? At 8 minutes there are only 4 left... "Come on people can it really be that hard?" Hanna and I are saying at the television. Hmmm... well there is only one way to find out - lets give it a try...

Since I am sure you were all wondering the same thing - here is what we found out: For one you have to stand still and concentrate - not flap around like Tara. I made it 8 minutes and that is with Hanna grabbing me 3 times for balance! The biggest challenge though was getting Rylee to not touch me for 8 minutes (she didn’t make it). It did start to hurt - but only a little - after about 5 minutes. Mostly in the foot and lower calf – but it was tolerable. You know... now that I think about it - when I jumped up for a mad rush to my puke bucket - I did get a cramp in my calf of the leg I was using to balance on the block (stack of books in our case).

Looking at these pictures I just cannot believe that the half filled box of Christmas decorations is still sitting in our TV room - put it away already, geesh...

The hardest part of the show I thought was watching Mike (brown team) working his heart out, sweating, crying while his Dad looked on. I mean here is your kid working so hard he is crying and he is standing there watching. I just wanted to yell at him "walk for goodness sakes, move, do something - so it's not all up to your kid!!!" I'm glad for Mike's sake that they are still there, because he is working SO hard!

So what do you guys think - have you picked a favorite team yet???

Thank you - I think we made it!!!

Thank you to all who called, emailed and commented and expressed concern about our lurking illness!!!

Wednesday morning round two with the stomach virus struck me with a vengeance! Just when I thought the stomach flu couldn't get any worse - well, trust me it can and it did!

Seriously, bad enough that I vow that the next time my husband is sick in bed for three days - he will have to disinfect his own stuff ;)

So picture this scene - I get sick about 2:00 am but don't start throwing up until 6:00 when the girls get up to get ready for school. At the same time my hubby crawls into the room I am in, because after 3 days in bed his back has locked up and he can't stand up. So here he is hunched over and crawling on the floor, while I am curled up clutching my bucket and we hear the girls footsteps on the stairs. Oh no - who is going to take care of the kids and get them ready for school. I mentally go through my list of friends - nope surly can't ask that of any of them. We don't have any family within 12 hours of us so we just have to tough it out.

Hanna, sweet daughter of mine, came to the rescue! She got breakfast for them both, got Ry dressed, packed snacks, told me not to worry about lunch - they would both buy it at school and got them out to the bus in time. Ahhh my girl is growing up... What I didn't realize until they got home was that she did all that for Rylee - but then wore her pajamas to school!

After we left off with the overwhelming cuteness...

...in that last post my friend called to say could I come get Hanna because she was throwing up all over her house. WHAT??? She was fine and having a blast with her friends just a short time earlier when I had checked on her. So I quick jump in the car, go the short distance and pick up my child - bucket in hand.

The poor girl was sick every 20 minutes for hours and hours. We needed to pick up a few things from the store and I briefly thought about bribing my husband to let me go... (seriously people, I do not do will with bodily fluids). Luckily (for me), her stomach was pretty much empty by the time I got to her.

About 8 hours later she slowed down to every hour and suddenly I was not feeling so well. So now I have to lie down and Pat gets to take over with Hanna. He "sleeps" on the floor close by Hanna while I sleep in the bedroom fighting off the nausea with every ounce of my being. We all survived the night and Rylee ran circles around us the rest of the weekend. (Pat managed to hold off the bug until Sunday night, but has been sicker than sick ever since!)

So on to the actual point of the title. While Hanna is so very sick, Rylee is trying to take pictures on the cell phone of the puking. I told her several times that we do not take pictures of people throwing up, nor do we take pictures of people while they are in (using) the bathroom and told her to put the phone away. But every single time I turn around she is back in Hanna's face with the camera. I say Rylee - why are you doing that??? "Because I want to Mama!"

How much cuteness can a person take??

Today Hanna spent most of the day with one of her friends so Rylee got some one on one time with Mommy and Daddy. She really was just oozing cuteness (and chatter) all day. Man this girl can talk, endless non-stop talking - and singing!

It really says something about you when you can be cute even when you are "scooping" the yard!

Biggest Loser Night

In case you didn’t know I am a big “reality” TV fan – Survivor, Amazing Race, Top Chef etc… love them all. So the homework was done (mostly) and it’s cold, COLD outside so I said to the girls “Hey – want to make some popcorn and go watch Biggest Loser???” To which they both enthusiastically replied “YES”! (It’s not as bad as it sounds, wait maybe it is – there was extra butter involved after all.)

So anyway we took out big bowl of extra buttery popcorn into the TV room to watch our recorded show about ya know… healthy eating and weight loss. We snuggled together and munched on our popcorn under warm blankets – so fun! We finished off the popcorn as the partners were desperately getting in their sweaty workouts and looking extremely close to passing out. Suddenly Hanna popped off the couch and left the room. A couple minutes later she came back in with an armload of weights. She begins to set them up in various places around the room and then wants to know if Rylee and I want to work out with her. Rylee and I look at each other and then back to Hanna. Rylee snuggles in closer and we both say “no thank you” at the same time. So Hanna takes some light hand weights and starts jogging around the room. Now this room is pretty small, so she is pretty much in the line of vision the whole time. It doesn’t take long and I start to feel a little guilty for just sitting while watching my 9 year old jog around the room in mini laps. So I say – “come on Rylee, let’s do some exercising with Hanna”. So for the next 45 minutes we did sit ups, hand weights and various other exercises while we watched to see who was going to get eliminated.

It was fun to see how much the girls have learned at school about exercise. It wasn’t long though before Rylee ran off to hide in the closet - of all things (claiming that she was preparing a surprise for us). After about 10 minutes I made her come back out and join us – she begrudgingly (as in nonstop complaining) made it through some sit ups. She is definitely not my athletic girl – much more my princess girl!

Here are a few pictures of our fun!

Rylee showing off her muscles!

Scruffy looking none too pleased that nobody is sitting still long enough for him to settle on a lap!

School Fundraising - looking for....

Every year the school does a Boosterthon Fun Run. The kids have an absolute blast trying to run as many laps as possible and they are supposed to find sponsors to pledge for each lap they run (now I know you are totally sighing right now thinking this is a pitch to pledge money for my adorably amazing, super speedy children - but it's not - just wait... it's something even better!).

The fundraising group sends home this high energy super hype DVD for us to watch with the kids. Rylee waits anxiously for Daddy to get home and through dinner until it is finally time that we can put the DVD in to watch. It is five minutes long and goes through what the kids can do and Rylee can hardly sit still "Yeah Mama, we get to do that!" "Ooooh, we gonna do that Mama!!!" and then they get to the parents part.

PARENTS: The only thing you have to do is come to the Boosterthon Fun Run AND bring relatives!!!!

Rylee says "Yeah Mama you can do that - you can bring de rebatives!"

I said "well I would, but we don't have any relatives here Ry"

Rylee "That's okay Mom, we can just buy some"

Sooooo - on to what we are looking for... I'm wondering if there are any relatives for sale in the general Mid-Alabama area??? Hmmm any takers?

Oh, and I should mention since the auto industry has not picked up yet - I can't actually pay you... so I will sweeten the pot with these pictures of my very lovely children!

Serious Life Magazine-take a peek!

I wanted you to know about this publication I’m a part of called Serious.Life Magazine. They just published the February issue today, and I am in their Featured Blog Directory. It’s a very high quality magazine… I think you will like it!

The magazine includes a lot of great content from bloggers you’ll appreciate, as well as great features, photos and other content. The magazine is owned and published by a family who have seven kids, three adopted and one who has Leukemia (http://www.riggsfamilyblog.com/). Abby (featured on the cover) is one of the little girls that I have been praying for and you see her button in my side bar.

The magazine gives away a bunch of ads to charities and ministries. Besides great articles on interesting people, there is a lot about family, adoption, personal finance, spiritual life, humor… all sorts of “life” topics.

The subscription is free too, so if you take a minute to check it out you can sign up for free to get future issues! http://www.seriouslifemagazine.com/