Misc pictures

Johnny and Eli as karate pirates.

Zoe sleeping with her Ducky Duck from Nan and Pop Pop

Eli sleeping with an assortment of animals, but cuddled up with his favorite, Owen. The two little blankets on top of the animals have to be placed just right :)

Butter Fingers

I want to start by saying that I love both of my children more than anything in this world. Zoe has completed our family and brings us joy every single day. With that said, I sometimes forget how things were when it was just the three of us. Pretty much everything, one way or another, the last nine months has revolved around Zoe. I sometimes feel like Eli gets the short end of the stick for now. He is an amazing brother and loves Zoe so much.

Right before Zoe was born, we would play Hide-and-Go-Seek after it got dark, right before Eli went to bed. Eli has been talking about it and keeps saying, "Mommy, remember when we would play Hide-and-Go-Seek before we had Zoe?" I told him we couldn't do that now because it would wake Zoe up. So, the last three nights after putting Zoe down for the night, we have played Keep Away with a balloon in the living room. Johnny and I play on our knees so we are closer to Eli's height (not so much fun moving around on your knees). It is so incredible to watch Eli come up with strategies to keep the balloon away from the person in the middle. We all three laugh and have had so much fun playing. It's that contagious belly laughing that has us in tears. The first night, he kept letting the balloon slip out of his hands, so I told him he had butter fingers. After I explained what that means, he kept saying it, and using the term correctly. He's so smart. The time we have alone with him is so precious. At the same time, I can't wait for Zoe to be big enough to join in the fun too.

Aliens

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Genesis 1:1

This is the Bible verse that Eli learned about in his Bible Study class this morning. They colored a picture and made a Styrofoam Earth on a stick. We were driving home and this was part of our conversation:

Eli: Mommy, all the people live on Earth. Except aliens, they live on other planets.

Me: Well, I don't believe that aliens are real.

Eli: Why not?

Me: Well, some people think they are real, and some people don't. I don't think they are real.

Eli: I do, and they are because I know they are.

Me: Which planets do you think they live on?

Eli: Not Earth, maybe Saturn or Mars. But, I'm sure they're real because I know they are.

Pre-K

To my precious Eli,

The last four and a half years (including being pregnant) have been so incredible. You have blessed my life beyond words. You are an amazing little man. You are smart, sweet and so much fun to be around. I love to listen to you tell me things you have learned. You have such a good memory and usually retell things pretty accurately. It is so great that you have such a desire to learn. You amaze me every day with something witty that you say and with questions you ask.

I enrolled you in Pre-K today. I cannot believe it is almost time for you to start school. You are so excited. I love to listen to you tell me things that you are going to do in school; "Reading, Math, Science, lunch and everything." I know you are going to do great, it's me I'm not so sure about. As excited for you as I am, I'm sad that you are growing up so fast. I have tried to convince you to let me home-school you, but you insist that you need to go to "real school".

I am so excited to see what the future holds for you. I know you are going to do AMAZING things!! I love you so much, and can't wait to be able to blog about all your accomplishments.

XOXOXO
Mommy

Robot Shower

Johnny and Eli are taking a shower while I'm goofing around on the computer. A very small part of their conversation is as follows (all in robot voices):

Eli: Daddy have you ever talked like a robot in the shower before?

Johnny: No, this is the first time.

Eli: Me too daddy, I've never done it before, this is the first time.

Johnny: That's a lot of water Robot #3. Malfunction, malfunction, malfunction!

I can't understand a lot of what Eli is saying through the closed door and over the shower. At the end, the robot voices turned to pirate voices.

Eli has been waiting all day for Johnny to take a shower with him. He doesn't get to do that much anymore, now that he's getting bigger. He has been taking showers by himself, with me reaching in a little to help.

Don't be a stick in the mud!

Where do I start? Well, it all started yesterday afternoon. We were supposed to be in Durant around 6:15 for a surprise birthday party for my cousin Heather. Johnny is out of town for a trial, so it was just the kids and me. The day started off great. We got up early and got around, then headed to the library for story time. As we drove into the parking lot, I remembered it was President's Day, so the library was closed. Eli was bummed, but got over it pretty quick. Instead, we ran to the grocery store and then headed home for lunch and a nap. We all three had a long nap and didn't wake up until 3:30. Now, the plan was to leave by 4:10 or 4:30. As soon as I saw the alarm clock, I knew that wasn't going to happen. I still had to feed Zoe and get all of our stuff together to head out for the rest of the day. When we were finally ready to go, Eli couldn't find his shoes. He is usually really good about putting them up in his closet where they belong. I don't know why, but the fact that this one time he didn't, really made me upset. Looking back, it was because we were running so behind, which is my fault, I should have set the alarm clock. Anyway, we finally found them in his bathroom behind the door. Then, I couldn't find the directions I had printed out, so I had to look them up again. It was just one thing after another. We finally headed out and I decided not to rush too much because we were going to miss the "surprise" part anyway. We made pretty good time, I took the exit off the highway in Durant, then it was all downhill from there. It was dark, the house we were going to was outside of town and there were no street lights so I couldn't see the street signs. I went back and forth several times and just could not find the street. I finally pulled over to reset the GPS and try to calm down from being so frustrated. When I thought I had it, I went to pull back onto the highway and discovered I was stuck in the mud. Again, we were on a pitch dark highway outside of town!! It looked like a grassy shoulder of the road. I couldn't tell in the dark how muddy and saturated the ground was. Several cars and pickups passed, but nobody stopped to offer help. I had my hazard lights on and after a few minutes began waving down cars. A highway patrolman slowed down, looked and just kept going. At this point all three of us were crying. I called Johnny and of course there was absolutely nothing he could do from Brownsville, but I was freaking out. I tried called Heather several times, but her phone kept going to voicemail, and I didn't have Garry's cell phone number. I left her a message and then called back a couple of minutes later. Finally I got her on the phone. They headed towards us to help. In the meantime a woman pulled over and said that she drives big trucks for the Army and gets them stuck and unstuck all the time and she could get me out. I ran down to her car and stayed with her little boy while she got my car out. I am so thankful to her for stopping. I really feel God placed her there right at that moment to help me. She grew up in Durant, but doesn't live there now. Anyway, by this time the party was over, it was 8:00, an hour after we actually arrived in Durant. My car was covered in mud and my babies were scared and hungry. We went back to Garry and Heather's and had a great time visiting and hanging out. We headed home a little after 11:00 and got home at 1:00 am.


































Then this morning I woke up to the alarming sound of EVERY SINGLE one of our smoke detectors going off at the same time. Eli kept his ears covered and it didn't really seem to bother Zoe. I disconnected three of them and that made it stop. There was no fire and I have no clue what made them go off.

I went to a Pampered Chef party with some girlfriends, then had to go to the airport. Johnny left a binder in his car at the airport that he needed for the trial. I had to get it to his office so they could overnight it to Brownsville. I came home to our awesome housekeeper making my house clean and shiny :)

The doorbell rang while Maria was finishing up and it was a man selling magazines. I usually quickly say "No thank you" and go about my day. However, something about him and his story was intriguing. He said that three months ago he was homeless and using drugs. His father was a drug addict and his mother was an alcoholic. He is 43 years old and the oldest man in the program. He is from Detroit and working for this company that has taught him communication skills and basic life skills. They go to homeless shelters and out on the street recruiting young men and try to give them a second chance. They sell magazine subscriptions and earn points. Once he earns 20,000 points, he won't go door to door anymore, he will be a youth mentor to other young men that have not made the best choices, whether it be drugs, alcohol, gangs, etc. We talked about how choices you make can greatly have an impact, whether positive or negative, on the rest of your life. He was recently saved and has developed a very strong relationship with God, you can see the excitement beaming from him. He asked me to pray for him and the future impact he can have on others. I was really impressed with his positive outlook. Hopefully his story was true and I didn't get duped into buying a magazine for nothing.

Last, I took my car to the self car wash and tried to get all of the mud off. Most of it came off pretty easy, but underneath by the tires was nearly impossible. It was so caked on and thick that it kept splashing back on me. When we got home, it was all over my pants and shirt. It was on my face and in my hair. I cannot imagine going mudding intentionally if the cleanup is such a pain. I just don't think the fun of driving in the mud and spinning out would be worth the trouble of cleaning up afterwords. I say this because in high school that was something the boys loved to do, go down to the river and go mudding. I've now had my share thank you very much. Hopefully that will never happen again.

"The Great Winter Storm of 2010"

We woke up this morning to Eli running towards our room yelling, "It's snowing, it's snowing!!" He was so excited. It was snowing big fluffy wet snowflakes. He has been talking about making snow angels since Christmas when it had snowed in Amarillo. We decided to bundle him up and let him go outside for awhile. He had on pajama pants, sweat pants, two shirts, his old tennis shoes, his heavy coat and big fluffy socks for gloves. He immediately ran to the edge of the patio and dove down to start his first ever snow angel. He later told me, "Mommy, I've waited my WHOLE LIFE to make a snow angel!" He ate snow off the tree branches, ran around, threw some snowballs and had a great time. We let him stay out for a few minutes, but it was very wet snow.

When we got back inside I was watching the news. The weatherman called it "The Great Winter Storm of 2010." They are expecting a whopping 3-7 inches, "the most snow Dallas has seen since 1978." It's wet slushy snow. The pictures of the highways look more like it's raining than snowing. Some schools have already canceled for today AND tomorrow. I don't mean to be a snow snob, but come on, I wouldn't exactly call this a great winter storm. I can remember in 7th or 8th grade one time there was snow up to my waist. They finally released school early, and that was only because most parents had already picked their kids up.

This afternoon, Zoe went down for a little nap and Eli and I got outside in the snow and built a snowman. It's been a fun day watching all the kids and parents on our street out playing in the snow.