Christmas Parade

We went to our town Christmas Parade last night, and were blessed again with very mild weather. Last year it was absolutely frigid and Ben was only a little over two weeks old or so. I had him wrapped up in about nineteen layers to keep warm. But last night all he needed was a light jacket. We had a rockin' par-tay...Luke pulled his truck up into one of the spaces on the main street and all the kids piled in the back so they could see and we could keep them corralled. I sat on the roof of the truck, using photgraph angle as an excuse, but really I just wanted to be by myself and I could say no to any kids that wanted to climb up there.

Above we have some of our local high schools struttin' their stuff in the band.

The kids enjoy the view from the bed of the truck...the Knights of Columbus from our church remind onlookers of the true reason for the holidays.

Patrick watches from atop Pa's shoulders as a decorated float goes by and then *GASP!* the fire truck!!!!

Some kids from my school marched in the parade, followed by more kids on our decked-out school bus. That's my boss Stephanie hanging out the door...I tried to get her face, but she was waving like a maniac!

Our town has a local Budweiser plant, so we always get to end the parade with the Clydesdale horses...followed by the man of the hour. He stopped to light the town Christmas tree in front of the old courthouse building and then rode on in all his glory. I feel like we've seen him so much lately that we're on a first-name basis with him!!!

The Polar Express

Last night, Ma and Pa took Patrick to Chattanooga to ride the Polar Express train all the way to the North Pole!!!!! How lucky are kids these days, huh? They went with some friend from church and their granddkids, Trevor and Nikki.

Patrick on the ride up...and presenting The Three Stooges!!!!

After dinner the kids met a fireman who was more than happy to show them the ladder truck. It doesn't get any better than that for Patrick...except when followed by ice cream!!!

Patrick and Trevor showing off their conductor hats. Aren't Trevor's eyes pretty? Nikki, being the cool gal that she is, gets to rock a pink conductor's hat!

The big moment...after they pull up to the North Pole, Santa boards the train. You can see the anticipation in Patrick's eyes! Santa listens intently as Patrick rattles off his laundry list of toy trucks that he wants for Christmas.

He had a great time but from what I hear he was zonked on the way home. He didn't remember switching cars or getting into bed. This morning when he woke up, he asked "Where's Nikki and Trevor?"

Thanksgiving Weekend

Thanksgiving weekend was packed with action and thankfully (haha) we were blessed with gorgeous weather. We went to my parents' house, where my brother and his family were also staying. I believe the last time we were all together was at Ben's baptism in February...too long! It was good to see them again. Thursday before the big meal, we all headed outside for some manly time playing sports. I did not participate, but snapped some great photos: We've got Luke channeling Joe Montana, Matthew and Grandpa showing off their baseball skills, Ben and Shaeffer waiting patiently for a fumble to roll their way, and Patrick getting his speed on for a touchdown over Team Daddy. Later at the park, Matthew and Patrick practiced their tackling technique and David instructed on the art of being a kicker. Ben was getting his own thrills by heading down the slide headfirst, with or without adult supervision. In between all the fun, we feasted on a top-notch Thanksgiving buffet, which I must say, since it did NOT include rutabagas, was the best one we've ever had!

On Friday morning we headed over to the famous Yellow River Game Ranch to check out the animals up close and personal. The deer greeted Ben as soon as we walked through the gate and then sniffed out Patrick for some food. We saw lots of other great animals, including the famous rubber-faced horse...
Later, Patrick and I headed over to Katie's for a little playdate. The boys got off to a great start on the Jumpoline (formerly known as the Jumpy Thing), but when Lenny started getting frisky with Fat-pick, we moved it inside to the playroom. Check out Joe doing his rendition of Stairway to Heaven, featuring Barbie on backup vocals!

Gigi gets a little more snuggle time in with her three grandsons and then this morning we headed back home. My boys were so tired from their big weekend, they fell asleep almost the minute the car backed out of the driveway. Good times, good memories. Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving weekend!!!

Happy Birthday Luke!

Happy Birthday to my dear husband Luke, and no this is not Luke in the picture--it's David--but I guess my gift to him was to not nag him about pictures, so I have none! We came down to my parents' house today for the Thanksgiving weekend, and the rest of the fam is here too, so since Luke's b-day is today and Sandi's is coming up soon, we had the party tonight. And of course, Patrick and cute little Matthew did the candle honors again...

A few words about the birthday boy...he is such a great daddy to my babies and a great husband to me. I literally would not have survived the past year without him. Besides that, for the past four years he has been working two jobs so that I can stay at home the majority of the time with the kiddies--how committed is that? You can always count on Luke to make you laugh (even if he didn't mean to) and he's not too shabby to look at either!!! Well, I could keep going on and on, but then I'd just be getting corny, huh? I love you Luke! Happy birthday and thanks for everything you do for our family!

Happy Thanksgiving to all my blogging gals out there. I'm going to enjoy the day tomorrow and I'll be back with the recap post on Friday! Eat an extra piece of pie for me!!!

She's baaaaack...

...and LAWS-A-MASSEY she's lookin' like a real sassy Aunt Jamima in her pink headwrap! Just kidding, she is a woeful sight, although she seemed in good spirits when I went to pick her up this morning. The wrap is to keep the wounded ear pressed flat against her head so it won't fill back up with fluid, although she keeps shaking it, so the ear did flip out of the bandages at one point. That was fun. Patrick took one glance and started screaming. I'll spare you the sight of it.

Poor baby, it must be so scary spending the night in a cold kennel when you're used to disobeying Mommy and stretching out on the couch...not to mention the wierd dog in the cage next to her that had apparently bathed in urine--he probably tried to deal her some sketchy rawhide last night. I know she is glad to be home. After she and Wilson greeted each other with some sniffs in the nether-regions, she slid under the bed to stay out of harm's way and catch up on much-needed sleep.

Take a walk in my shoes...

I always have to laugh when I see Luke deal with the kids by himself, not because he's not doing well enough--he does great--but because it gives me great satisfaction to watch from the outside as my kids drive someone else up the wall. The other day Luke was trying to eat his lunch after the kids, which is a futile effort because even though they just ate, they will still try and eat everything on your plate...but I let him figure that out for himself as I sat back to enjoy the show...

The reach-in...

Luke defends his territory!

In the end I put down the camera and helped him out, but it's always nice when someone else feels my pain, if only for a few moments!

*Sniffle*

I took this picture hoping it will not be the last pretty picture I get of Savannah. Yesterday I took her to the vet, mostly because it was time for her annual check-up, but also because she has been in pretty bad shape recently. First of all, she is losing A LOT of weight--wierd since she was overweight at one point in her life--and you can count all of her ribs and vertabrae and see the bones in her haunches and shoulders and even the top of her head. She's like the canine Nicole Richie. Anyway, I attribute this to the fact that she spends her days neurotically running around the yard chasing non-exisitent things and is probably burning waaaayyyyyy more calories than she is ingesting. The vet seemed to agree with me, since he couldn't find anything wrong with her externally, but we're waiting to get bloodwork results back just to make sure. Meanwhile, she's now on a high-fat high-protein diet, while poor lazy Wilson has to eat small portions of fat-dog food (even though he's not, but he will get that way if we don't watch him).

The other thing that wrong with her is that she's developed a hematoma in her ear, which requires major surgery to be removed. The reason I know this is because she had one three years ago and we had to go through this whole charade at that point too. I am really worried because when she came out of that surgery, she looked like she had a wet oil rag attached to the side of her head instead of her pretty velvety ear. It did heal correctly, thankfully, but the vet told me that there was a chance it wouldn't, so now we're going to have to hold our breath and see again. She's going in tomorrow and has to spend the night. I'll put a picture up of her afterwards so you can feel good and sorry for her...you can go ahead and feel sorry for me now because this bill ain't gonna be cheap!

Sorry for the downer post, but I am down about the whole thing and I had to vent and draw sympathy. Tomorrow we will be back to our regularly scheduled post demonstrating the torture my children put me through every day.

A Puzzler...

How can my kids be such goofballs with such awesomely cool parents...?

Patrick's Thanksgiving Program

Today was Patrick's Thanksgiving program at school and he all of a sudden decided to get stage fright. He cried all through the two-year-olds' performance and the only way his teacher could get him on stage was to promise to let him hold one of the flags while everyone pledged their allegiance. Here he is unhappily holding the flag for her.

After the pledges, he managed to forlornly stand on stage for one song about eating the turkey, then burst into tears. As everyone watched sympathetically (and we're talking about 100 parents here), his teacher asked him what was wrong and he wailed "That SCARED me!!!!"...so then he had to get down and watch his class do the rest. He was fine afterwards.

At the time I just thought he was being a pill, but having reflected on it, I think he may actually not like to perform for large groups of strangers (imagine that!). I think for the Christmas program I will plan to have him sit on my lap and we will watch together.

Priorities

I guess today at preschool Patrick's activity was to sort through magazines and find pictures of things that he is thankful for. Of all the things in the world, here is what Patrick chooses to give thanks for:
1. Fire boots
2. Puppy dogs

The funny thing is, I am 100% positive that he did not just find two random pictures and slap them in the page. Oh no...he saw those boots and thought "THAT'S what I am thankful for!" I have no idea where I fall in the pecking order, but at least the dogs made the cut...

Happy Birthday to My Baby!

It was a year ago today that I first met my baby boy, and I have to admit that I was very unprepared for the whole experince, even though it was my second child. I had trouble from the very start with him...even in the hospital I let the nurses keep him so I could get some sleep. Then when I came home, the thought of taking care of two needy little boys was completely overwhelming to me.

It's ironic that these two pictures are of him sleeping, because he didn't do a whole lot of that in the beginning. It was really hard for me to squeeze in the "me" time that I had gotten used to with one child. The memories that these pictures conjure up are more stressful than anything. But I could never resist smiling at that precious face!

Playtime with Katie (who kept things in perspective for me)
and starting to bond with big brother.

The arrival of warm weather and sitting up changed a lot for me. Now that he wasn't a helpless, tireless little baby any more, Ben was really becoming fun. I loved it when he started getting responsive and playful.

Hugs for Benjamin!

Turning into such a big boy...and finally buddies with Patrick!

Growing up is tiring work!

At the end of the first year, I wouldn't have traded one tough minute for the adorable little mommy's boy that I have now. Once we got into our groove, he brought me so much joy and cuddliness that I can't image my life without him. His smile is the sight that warms my heart each day and his laugh is the sound that feeds my tired soul. Happy birthday, my sweet baby Ben. I love you sooooo much!

Ben's Birthday Party

We had Ben's 1st birthday party tonight and I can safely say it was not a disaster. I tried to keep it low-key and I think that helped a lot, but I am still too tired for witty play-by-plays, so I'll let the pictures do the talking. Here we have Ben opening presents...

...and of course, the big cake moment (well, cupcakes). Ben looked genuinely confused as everyone sang to him. The look on his face was priceless. Patrick did the candle honors again...

...and then Ben polished off that cupcake in no time!

After we ate the kids went outside and toasted marshmallows in our chiminea. I got this for Luke over three years ago as an anniversary gift, and this is the first time he's used it. Before this it was primarily a way to catch rainwater. I think he was sorry that he waited so long, though, because he was really enjoying it tonight. He was so proud of his HOT fire that he made me take a picture and promise to put it on the blog. Well, it did keep us toasty warm, so we all enjoyed it.

Anyway, as of 1:45 tonight Ben will be a year old (thank God!), so look for a very special birthday post tomorrow! A year ago at this moment, my stomach was really hurting!!!! :)

Fun at the Festival

Today my parents came up and took the kids to our Annual School Bazaar. This has become a tradition over the past three years. While I work at it, my parents get to spend an enjoyable time with the kids. They had a great time. Patrick spent lots of time jumping on the inflatables and both boys won a cake at the cake walk!

Luke's mom and grandma were also there. Here's Ben enjoying a chocolate covered pretzel stick with his Ma and hitching a ride on Great-Grandma's walker!

Later when we got home, we celebrated Ben's birthday with my parents since they aren't going to be here for his party tomorrow. My dad's birthday was a couple weeks ago, so it was a double party. And since we had two cakes to choose from, I didn't even have to bake! Sweet! Ben was clueless to the whole birthday thing. Patrick did the candle honors for him and he barely even noticed his presents. Oh well...next year will surely be different! By the way, I know that Ben is only one and there are two candles on the cake...one was for Ben and the other for my dad.

Ho Hum

Being sick for weeks upon weeks doesn't make for great blogging material, but here are a couple shots of the boys to take up space. Thankfully, we are all feeling much better now.

Sweet Picture of Ben

Last week, due to the onset of my never-ending illness, I got some rare free playtime with Ben. As you may know, both the boys go to church preschool programs on Tuesday and Thursday mornings, and that's when I go to work. Patrick also goes Wednesday mornings, and I normally use that time when I just have Ben to do my weekly grocery shopping. But last week I felt too yucky to navigate the aisles of Wal-mart, so Ben and I just stayed home and played. I was pushing him in his swing when I noticed what a pretty shade of gold all the leaves were behind him...snapshot moment!

And just in case any of you need an update on my health and that of those around me, it's not good. This virus will not go away!!! My stomach (and a part of me six inches below) gave me a nice little wake-up call at 5:45 this morning. Also, Patrick has taken a turn for the much, much worse. He spent most of the day yesterday running to the bathroom, poor thing, and it has really taken a lot out of him. I put him on the couch at 8:00 this morning and he has not moved an inch. If any of you know my son (or your own son for that matter), then you know he is SICK. Now Ben...the jury's still out on him. He threw up yesterday during lunch, so we thought he'd caught it too, but I am starting to think that he had just gagged on a goldfish cracker, because he seems fine today. Anyway, still waiting for someone to come over and take care of us all, but for some reason, there aren't many takers...

The Year in Review

Well, girls, it all started a year ago today, when Jennifer talked me into starting up the old blog. I didn't have much to say back then, but that has sure changed! But I am glad, because it has been fun to make so many "cyber-friends" along the way. And so, on this 5th day of November, 2006, I give you...the most memorable moments of of Becky's blog:

There was not too much time for blogging in December...just one quick update with a family picture.

My true feelings about having a newborn in the house find their way onto the blog.

My first comment! Thanks, Brian and Jenny!

Patrick starts acting like a 3-year-old a month too early...

I find out just how deceitful the world of household cleaning products is.

Mandy switches to Blogger, and Katie contemplates it.

Katie finally (and somewhat disastrously) makes her blogging debut.

The dogs get introduced.

My life finally starts getting easier.

The first-ever BLOG PARTY!

The original blogging gals get togther.

Celebrating my favorite holiday.

Patrick will say anything...

Or do anything....

Or do my blogging for me!

Lenny makes a guest appearance on my blog.

And finally, there's the infamous Sob Story, which I don't need to link because it's just below this post. It kinda brings us full circle, don't you think? Anyway, it's been a good year, folks. Here's to many more blogging memories, now with our bigger and better group! Cheers!

My Sob Story

Let's recap: Tuesday I got achy and feverish. Wednesday, I felt a lot better, but still achy and feverish. Thursday the "sick" part of my sickness hit. And today I felt a lot better, but still have no appetite. And it's good that I felt a lot better because Luke worked from 7:30 am to 10 pm today and will be working from 9:30 am to 5 pm tomorrow, so at least I can be civil to my kids since I have to spend two days alone in the house with them. Ben has been sick for a week. He has a runny nose that just won't quit and has started to have nasty poop. It's not the big D, but well, let's just refer to it as "pea soup poop"--green and mushy and stinky (well, I actually like pea soup a lot, but maybe not anymore) . I knew I should have taken him to the doctor today, because I know darn well that the Dimetapp's not helping and that it's moved beyond a cold and into sinus infection territory, but I stupidly thought "let's just wait two more days and if he's not better by Monday, I'll take him in then". Besides, I had to go to the post office and mail invitations to all of Luke's family for Ben's upcoming b-day party, so we all know there'd be no time for the doctor anyway (and there wasn't...we were in that d#&% post office for 45 min!). So, the stage is set for a not-so-fabulous weekend anyway.

Fast-forward to 7:15 this evening...I'm checking the blog, Patrick is upstairs playing and Ben is happily watching Baby Einstein. Patrick urgently yells to me that he has to go poop, but this is nothing extraordinary--he always says it urgently. I holler at him to go and I will be right up to help him wipe (how long does this last, by the way?). A minute later he comes down and says he pooped in his pants, then pulls them down to show me a big wet fart. I put him on the toilet and start rinsing his underpants while he does some naaaaasty stuff in the toilet. When he's done, I tell him to go upstairs and put a pull-up on, just in case. So he heads back upstairs, but not quickly enough, apparently, because a minute later he is running back down the stairs, poop (oh yes, it's the big D) streaming down his legs and into his socks screaming "MOOOOOOOMMYYYYYYYYYYYY! I POOPED ON MY FLOOOOOOOOR! Great. Just great. So I plop him back on the toilet, add the socks to the ever-growing pile of clothes in the sink, threaten him within an inch of his life if he moves, and go upstairs to survey the damage. OH. MY. HEAVENS. There is not enough cleaning product in the world to take care of this mess. My first thought was "I'm going to have to get new carpet...tomorrow." An hour later, and lots of dishwasher detergent (which works surprisingly well) later, the room no longer smells like a sewage treatment center, although it does smell strange and not entirely pleasant. I may have to take Mandy's suggestion and saturate the carpet with vinegar. I don't care if it burns holes in the carpet...that's just less carpet to smell.

So my story ends with me being sick one more time (nice) and then calling Dr. P.J., who is my boss' husband, and pleading with him to call a prescription in for Ben and give me free advice on what to do with Patrick besides keep him in pull-ups until I see a regular poop again. And for once, I don't feel sorry about hitting up P.J. for free medical service while he's eating dinner on a Friday night. This time, I just feel sorry for myself.

Happy Birthday to David

Happy Birthday--one day late--to my brother David, whom as you all know is pretty unbeatable as a brother in my opinion. It's very befitting that he entered this world on All Saints' Day, because he has been a saint to me my whole life. How many girls can say that their big brother treated them like royalty? He's practically perfect, except that he doesn't like mushrooms, which I think is wierd. Thanks, David, for teaching me how to throw a baseball, shoot a basketball, taking care of me when I had my wisdom teeth taken out, dancing with me at weddings, and telling me all those stories about Charles (who was dark and dank, and all mouth). Hope your birthday was the best, and we can't wait to see you guys at Thanksgiving!

Anyway, here he is with his 22-month-old son Matthew, who is so cute I want to squeeze him until he POPS! And I had to throw this one in of Matthew and David doing their part for the cure for breast cancer, because it's just so darn precious!

Come As You Are...

Okay, here's the thing...today is my brother's birthday. I was getting on the blog to post my happy birthday wishes to him, and it turns out I got tagged to play "Come As You Are", which involves taking your-self portrait and posting it right this very second! A dilemna: which to blog about? I have decided to play along with the game, for two reasons:

1. I already have my Halloween post up today, and I don't want David's birthday to have to share with two other posts, I want him to have his own post on his own day. So even though it's going to be a day late, tomorrow's going to be all about him. So make sure you check back and wish him a Happy Birthday!

2. David has always been a stickler for the rules. If the rules say I have to play the "Come As You Are" thing right now, then he understands. He would rather wait a day than have his little sis break the rules. ;)

So here I am, at my computer, and I am still sick, sick, sick. I do not feel good. The 24-hour bug is turning out to actually be the flu, I think. I took the picture with the flash off so that you wouldn't see my icky-toned, greasy complexion. The only good thing is that I am losing pounds by the minute since I have had nothing to eat for two days. Now, how to keep those pounds off once I get better...????

The second part of this game is to talk about the person who tagged you...in my case, Mandy. Ahhh, good old Mandy. My bestest bud since college, and the world's TOP roomate. She is the greatest roomate, seriously. You don't even realize she's there, except for all the fun you're having together. Since Mandy and I sadly don't get to spend a whole lot of time together due to completely different lives, I probably can't say anthing current about her that you don't already know, so I'll go back to those old roomate days and relay the memories.

The best thing is that we were both totally obsessed with a game called "Double Solitaire". I'm not going to get into how it's played, but I will tell you that we both often got ready for class really quickly so that we could play before we had to leave. Then there was the rat in our apartment. He became our third tenant for a few days. We declared an all-out war on that rat, and won. Word to the wise: use dental floss to tie an apple piece onto a rat trap and the little sucker doesn't have a chance. There was also the war that Mandy so bravely declared on our landlord over the status of our rent checks, and also won. YOU GO MANDY! Finally, I shall reminisce about our Christmas tree. We were SO cheap! We spent the money on the tree and the lights (maybe two strands), and then we decided that we would make our ornaments. So we bought some sort of Crayola putty stuff and cut them out with cookie cutters and hung them on the tree with paper clips! We didn't buy a star or an angel, we just made a big red bow out of cheap ribbon. And we didn't want to buy the tree stand, so we filled a bucket with rocks and stuck it in there. Then I decided I wanted to sleep in the living room so I could look at the tree lit up, so we undid the pull-out couch. Unfortunately, the next moring, we could not push it back in, so we went for a while with a bed in our living room instead of a couch. Ahhhh...good times, Mandy...care to add anything?

The last part of this game is to tag someone else, so here are mine:

1. Jennifer
2. Jenny
3. Pamela (who is officially Shannon's turf, but since Shannon seems to have gotten lost in Spain, I'm going to go ahead and get Pammie in the game).

Trick-or-treating and the 24-hour bug

As luck would have it, I came down with a mild stomach bug yesterday morning. I get these things about twice a year, and yet they always take me by surprise. You may remember the last time I had one. This time wasn't so bad. Anyway, thank God my kids nap well, because I brought them home from school, threw them into bed and fell into my own bed with a bottle of 800 mg ibuprofen. I really wanted to feel better so I could take Patrick trick-or-treating since this is the first year he really "gets" it. Miracle of all miracles, I actually did rally and was able to go with the boys. But I must have really pushed myself because as soon as I got home I relapsed and fell back into bed. It was worth it though...we had a great time.

We went to my boss' neighborhood to go with her crowd since for some reason our neighborhood doesn't do T-or-T. Patrick loved it, although he kept saying "that's enough" because he wanted to go back to her house and eat the candy! The two greatest moments were when we went to Stephanie's (my boss) mom's house (whom Patrick knows) and when no one was looking, he started grabbing as much candy as he could and stuffing it into his bag. I cannot imagine where he gets these tendencies...anyway, the other great one was towards the end, when he got he hang of it all, so I started letting him walk across those big yards and go to the door by himself. Most of the time, kids were already at the door and the resident was still standing there. However, at one house, the lady had gone back inside and so I yelled for him to ring the doorbell. But he must not have heard me, because he just stood at the door yelling "TICK OR TREAT!" until she finally heard him and came out. I just about wet my pants.