Catching up

Boy do I have lots to catch up on...

These were taken back on Jim's birthday and show some of Nathan's personality...
(I'm pretty sure the middle picture is the face he makes when he's pulling my hair or torturing the cat. Jim swears it looks like he's wanting someone to scream 'Uncle!' before he lets go of a first full of hair.)

I think he likes what he sees...

On Sunday, Jim was mowing the grass while Katherine was pushing around her shopping cart searching for rocks and grass to buy. Nathan wanted to go outside also...


Nathan got to go outside, now he doesn't want his knees to touch the grass...
Nathan ready to drive, anything...
Sunday night, little lady came down with a fever. I'm pretty sure it was just a tummy bug because by Tuesday morning she was feeling fine. Although on Monday for her nap, I got some precious, worth waiting for eye-gazing time in with her. She asked me to cuddle her for her nap. I was more than happy too and after some fidgeting around we ended up facing toward each other. Then, she said, "Mommy, I just want to look in your eyes." I got the chance of a lifetime to gaze into her 3-year-old beautiful big blue eyes, uninterrupted, with the soft sunlight filtered through sheer window shades. She willingly looked into mine, was still and quiet and let me gaze into hers. I studied everything about her eyes and they were beautiful. Her pupils kept changing size, even though the light was constant in the room. Her irises are stunning: colors of medium to dark blue, with splashes of green and light grey and I'm pretty sure I saw some silver. I saw my own reflection when my focus changed and her eyelashes are so long and plenty. Then the blinks started getting longer and heavier. She fought it for a while and the last blink led her to a very needed and productive rest. I gently caressed her face, careful not to wake her, and watched her some more. It was another perfect moment to pray for my child. I cried to God with overwhelming thankfulness for my children's health. Her tummy bug was nothing compared to other friend's and family's battles they've had to face with their children. For some reason, God's will for our lives right now is to have two very healthy children, and I am so grateful. I loved getting the chance to stare into her eyes and I'm glad I chose not to clean the floors that afternoon. That's 15 minutes I'll cherish forever.

Tuesday we went to go visit our friends at their timeshare at the beach. It was an hour and a half drive one-way, but worth it. I waited until Katherine woke up from sleeping in and asked her if her tummy hurt. It didn't so then I asked her if she wanted to go to the beach. (Insert: wild, crazy, jumping around and screeching here). So off we go to the beach to meet our friends, the E family. They were so helpful and made the trip extra special, because I certainly wouldn't try a trip to the beach by myself with two small munchkins. The kiddos must have had so much fun because neither of them slept on the way home. Uh, what was up with that? I would have suspected that the combination of sun, extra exercise and the quiet, still and comfy car seat would have done the trick coming home. What do I know, I'm just their mother.

Nathan is cutting a fourth tooth. His two 'central incisors' on the bottom are in and it looks like his two 'lateral incisors' on top are coming in, which makes for funny pictures for a couple of months. Wednesday, he surprised me with letting me cuddle him to sleep for his afternoon nap. I'm sure the crying was because of his tooth so I was more than happy to hold him and calm him down. He very sleepily gazed into my eyes, blinked for long periods of time, was ever so still and a warm feeling came over me. I thought I should get up and maybe try cuddling with him in our bed so I could rest also and as I got up, the warm feeling started to slide down my leg. Yep, you guessed it, poop. I immediately tried to squat to lessen the effect gravity might have to avoid it landing on the carpet, and not disturb my sleepy prince who might be up for cuddling. Ok, so now what do I do? Squatting, with warm poop on my thigh, holding an almost asleep baby: I made the decision that the poop was more important. I put him on the changing table and used the wipes to start cleaning myself and the little bit that eventually fell on the floor. Long story short, after all the excitement and a bath at 3pm, he wasn't up for cuddling or anymore of a nap. Blasted poop.

Little guy decided to bust a move listening to 'Row, row, row your boat,' (I still haven't figured out how to edit videos so there are some not as interesting parts I would like to edit out)...

Wednesday was also special because my grandma got to witness me speaking directly to the wall, about 6 inches away from it, because I was pretty sure the wall would listen more than my daughter was. Grandma looked a little concerned for me at first, but then realized that I was actually behaving fairly normal, or at least she thought so also.

Friday, Jim received an email from the grad school with this message, "
-->Your final submission has been reviewed and has been accepted by the Editorial Office-- congratulations!" Whoo hoo! August 8th is graduation day and short of a couple phone calls and picking up regalia, all that's left is walking across the stage. He's stoically excited. For those of you who know Jim, that totally makes sense.
That morning, my friend Amy stopped by with her 3 girls. We've known each other since middle school. That is one of my favorite things about living in the same town I was raised in: 'old' friends. Our kids had a fun time outside playing in the kiddie pool. Nathan insisted on being a pure boy and continually splashed the little girl 3 weeks older than he. Katherine had fun playing with the girls her age and 3 years older. They are cute girls and I always enjoy visiting with their mommy. We were also roommates in college for a couple years so we always have lots of stories to laugh about and we know enough about each other's quirks, weaknesses and strengths. It's a little chaotic at times with 5 of them running and crawling around, but my tolerance-meter must be on the verge of breaking or just plain about to give up because it doesn't bother me anywhere near like it used to.
Later that afternoon, Nathan woke up too early from his nap and I rocked him back to sleep. A little while later, he woke up again and I decided to trying cuddling. With a clean diaper, we snuggled in the bed and I peacefully enjoyed holding my little man until his nap was over. It was about 30 minutes of time with him I've been craving.

Today, we bought some landscaping materials to complete the play area outside and daddy surprised us with plans to go to Bamah and Papa's lake. On the way there, we were surprised to see this in the back seat.It's so sweet because their touching is still nice and loving. Now that they are able to touch each other, I dread the day when it's not with nice intentions.

So we went to the lake, swam a little, ate grilled hamburgers and hotdogs with the fixin's and sides and swam some more. Katherine inherited my carefulness in the water and the ability to attract every single mosquito in sight and Nathan inherited his daddy's lack-of-fear of the water. He's already eager to put his face in the water, most of the time while trying not to breathe. Constantly splashing anything and everything around is preferred, including his own face.

He still doesn't want to let his knees touch the ground (and the answer is no: he does not do this inside the house, only outside or other less-than-desirable-to-crawl-on surfaces)...

Daddy and daughter...
We had a busy and fun week. Next week will be busy again preparing for our trip to go whitewater rafting in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Although Nathan would probably like it, me and the kids are not going rafting, we're just going for the ride, beautiful scenery and company. Our good friends are going up there with their kids and grandkids (same ages as ours). Of all the fun things daddy would want to do, whitewater rafting is probably at the top. So, in honor of his graduation, we're taking a celebratory trip. We took a 10 hour trip with Katherine when she was 9 months old and she did better than we expected, so.....hopefully we'll be pleasantly surprised on this one also.

Lord, I apologize

I tricked Katherine into thinking I was 'adjusting' the camera when I got her tell me about "celebrating her baby's birthday." Normally, she won't act like herself when the video comes out so this was a treat.



That was baby Octopus, turning 32, with no birthday cake today, but tomorrow. I love the dramatic expressions with her eyes and pronunciations. Can you tell when mini-destructo comes near us? There's a natural scattering that occurs.

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Tonight, I was reading one of the blogs I follow religiously and thought this quote was worth repeating.
"You might as well embrace the fact that, until at least the majority of your kids can wipe themselves, your family will be a very entertaining sideshow."
Boy, did I feel like that on Saturday when I tried to carry both kids (one asleep in his car seat), my purse, a bag to return items and a family-size umbrella into Wal-Mart, while it was raining, for a whopping refund of $7 and to buy some formula. One man even commented, "Boy, that looks like fun" as we were trying to leave. And, in true Larry the Cable the Guy fashion, I humbly say, "Lord, I apologize" to the lady who came eagerly running toward me, covered in a bright yellow rain poncho, to deliver a flier soliciting donations for the Stuff the Bus campaign. My reaction was less than Jesus-like: I shot her eye-daggers, raised my eyebrows, did the frustrated-mom-head-bob and tersely snapped, "Oh come on. Do I look like I have a free hand, lady?"

I kept justifying the trip because we really did need formula. Deep down inside, there was another reason, I'm just not sure what it was.

Natural light

It's amazing how a little natural light will transform a photograph. Little man played nicely, pre-nap, so I could get some good photos and practice.
Bubble boy...

Beautiful smiles to melt mommy's heart...
Thanks, Amber for the photography posts. Adjusting the ISO on the borrowed point and shoot and making the effort to capture in natural light really does make a difference. I want the photo to reflect the light my eyes process, and this is pretty close.

Twirl status = pleased

Yesterday was an exciting day. It was daddy's birthday and I finally finished sewing Katherine's princess skirt (spurred on by a minor meltdown before a trip to Publix that morning because none of her dresses were long enough or twirled just right). I'm certainly not winning any awards with this one, but she doesn't care. Finishing it inspired me to buy some patterns online for skirts and adorable dresses too. We'll see how long it takes me to makes those.

Here she is with the finished product; can you tell she's proud...
It is so thick with material (I made it similar to a tree skirt pattern) that it's almost difficult for her to twirl. She doesn't seem to mind though. It has princesses on it, it's long enough and it TWIRLS!

She put it on today, gently rubbed her hands over the sateen fabric down her thighs, sighed and said, "I look like a mommy." I'm so taking that as a compliment. She wore it, her plastic princess shoes and carried her magic wand into Subway tonight. I told you we were going to do it again.

So back to yesterday, here they are making daddy's cupcakes...
Someone licking the bowl again...
And little man enjoying his first bite of a cupcake...

Daddy wanted to go out to eat for his birthday and on the way there he was trying to ask little lady what she did that day. After a couple of unsuccessful attempts she said to him, "Daddy, please be quiet, I need to concentrate." Yes she has heard that a time or two. I am not gifted in the ability to tune out undesirable noises.

She's also figured out that if she wants to get our attention while riding in the car, all she has to do is declare, "I gotta go pee-pee REALLY bad." We've caught on to it, but there's always that little nagging voice that will chant, "She told you so, she told you so" if there ever was an accident. Although, most of the time, it's nowhere near as urgent as she makes it sound to be. We know this after many trips speeding home through residential neighborhoods, squealing into the driveway on two tires, screeching to a halt leaving tire marks, opening the car door before it stops while the other one is frantically trying to open the door to the house, to find out that she seems to be more interested in a worm that has dried up and died on the pavement. So when she made the announcement on the way home from the restaurant, we did not panic, we just calmly assured her that we were almost home and she could hold it. Her rebuttal: "Well then, I just wanna go pee-pee in somebody's yard." Daddy asked who's yard and she said, "Anybody we know."

So today, as I was cleaning up the kitchen from breakfast, I found myself seriously jamming out to Diego's rescue pack song. (Diego is Dora the Explorer's cousin; Nickelodeon cartoons). And to clarify what my "jamming out" means; it involves shaking my rear, bobbing my head and adding in an air guitar or air drum to finish off singing into the spoon I'm pretending is a microphone. Just in case you haven't heard it, check out the first 40 seconds of this grainy, bad video on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdTvizTOGCs
It's kind of catchy, but seriously, is this what I've been transformed into? I'll admit that I'm not "cool" anymore (see, kids don't even use the word "cool" do they?) but this is really putting a damper on any semi-successful attempts I might have in the future to maintain my "coolness."
Oh well, it was bound to happen I guess.

Pre-walking woes

Yesterday, I found myself wishing Nathan would hurry up and learn how to walk (gasp! What are you thinking girl?). His bottles, all 9 of them with 5 intricate hard-to-wash parts each, needed washing right then. Little man was doing his normal whine for mommy, and he was tugging at my pants. Thanks to Weight Watchers and his very strong grip, I ended up standing in the kitchen, hands full of soapy suds for about 10 minutes with my drawers on the ground around my ankles, leaving no "handles" for Mr. whiney-poo. It's at times like these that I'm thankful for the obvious reasons: the FedEx man didn't have a delivery for our front door, it was daytime and not dark outside with our fluorescent lights shining on my derriere, the phone didn't ring, or a neighbor didn't come over to chat.

Hi, my name is Kelle, and I'm the mother of a pre-walker.

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Katherine can be quite lovey with her little brother when she wants to be. She will break a content silence or unhappy wimper of his to proclaim, "I Love You!" and smother him with kisses all over his cheeks, forehead, head, ears, back of neck, etc. He doesn't seem to mind. I'm pretty sure he's trying to reciprocate sometimes.

































I thought this was cute also. She loves it when Papa reads her "The Three Little Pigs." He lets her recite the repetitious parts of the story, with gusto! They are quite the pair in this picture, just enjoying a summer evening.


















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Side note: for those of you who have asked about it, I made leaving comments easier.

Sleepless in the Suburbs

My children couldn't be anymore different when it comes to sleeping. For instance, today Katherine woke up around 7-ish, took a 2 1/2 hour nap and she probably won't fall asleep until almost 10. She finally went to sleep for her nap today pretty late so I didn't go in to wake her until 5:10 and this is what she looked like in the living room at 5:30...


















On the opposite end of the spectrum, Nathan woke up at 5:45, fell asleep in the Jump-N-Go at 8:05 (for less than 5 minutes), fought sleep hard in the church nursery but managed to squeak out a 45 min. nap, put up another battle during the 3 o'clock hour which lasted for only half an hour, almost fell asleep during his bath and was asleep by 7:15. He was doing so good too with sleeping in (or at least entertaining himself in his bed) until 7. Then again, he could be getting a tooth. They get blamed for everything anyway.


















I know this too is a season, but this natural-born night-owl is close to being a walking zombie. When you combine me finally getting to do stuff that I can't get to during the day, taking her to the bathroom usually twice a night and waking up with Mr. early bird, it equals a lot less sleep than my body requires. More importantly, lack of sleep just gets me in a baaaaaaadddddd mood.

After supper Katherine wanted to play on her "omputer." She has become quite proficient with it. It teaches her how to use the keyboard, mouse and arrow keys. Brother has to watch from a safe distance.








































I'm afraid we might have a streaker living in our household. Katherine stripped down to her BDay suit while we were outside working in the back yard and proceeded to splash around in the cold hose water; then she came inside and started vacuuming with her little Hoover. Good heavens.

Brave at heart

Two weeks ago (had to wait on developing pictures before posting) I was stricken with a mutation of the "brave" gene I've never experienced before. I decided to let Katherine fingerpaint inside the house. Don't worry though, I wasn't totally out of my usual mind. Nathan was asleep, I put a giant sheet down on the kitchen floor, put one of my trashy T-shirts on her and let her rip. She very carefully used the paint brush first and then when I suggested using her fingers, her eyes lit up. Painting the over-sized Princess drawing-pads were nowhere near as fun as painting her fingers, then hands, then wrists, then arms up to her elbows. Ok, Ok, that's far enough. We're supposed to go eat in about half an hour. She was easy clean-up, the brushes, paint and floor were easy clean-up, so all-in-all in was a great experience for both of us.

(warning: last of the bad disposable camera pics ahead)













































Little man is fearlessly letting go of objects and standing for a second or 2. He is also preferring "real" food over baby food and shoveling is the method of delivery.
















Tonight, while daddy was giving Nathan a bath, I decided to help Katherine burn off some steam before bedtime. So, we decided to go outside in the drizzling rain. She has become fascinated with holding her own umbrella by herself so we both loaded up our size-appropriate umbrellas, put on our croc-like shoes and headed outside looking for puddles to splash in. We live in a clean, curb and gutter subdivision so the big, muddy puddles I was looking for were hard to come by. I'm pretty sure she was okay with that because last year I tried introducing her to playing in the mud after a good rain; she played for about 5 seconds, stared at her fingers stretched far apart, scrunched up her nose and said, "Mommy, I no want to play in the mud anymore." So the next half an hour, we took our sweet time walking around the block scoping out big puddles to splash in. Her splashes were dainty and sweet and my splashes were soaking her up to her neck. Ok, back up next time sweetie. (Notice: I didn't offer to splash smaller). She had a blast.

The beginning of our walk led us to talk to our neighbors and Miss C taught her how to twirl her umbrella above, in front and to the side, then top it off with a body twirl. During the puddle expedition I started twirling my umbrella, but I was quickly corrected to twirl in front first, then up top then twirl around. Didn't know I was such a bad umbrella twirler.

Great news!

Jim passed his defense today on this long and arduous journey toward a Master's degree. He has some minor revisions to make to his thesis and its first submittal to the Graduate School is June 15th.

When he was told he passed, there were no streamers, confetti, kazoos blaring or cheers from even a small crowd. It was rather anti-climactic. He left the building, changed the tail light in his truck that had been out for over a month and began working on ANOVA tables for his thesis. But unfortunately, that is the nature of the beast. There are so many steps in the process, and each one seems to take forever, that when one is considered done and can be checked off, it's just not as exciting as you wish it could be. But it is one more item checked off.

What a great lesson for life. So many times we have a checklist. Whether it is one we've enjoyed creating or one we know just needs to be done. Most of the time there are many sub-sections involved with completing the overall task. Each one takes on a different life of its own:

• The ligustrums in the back yard were trimmed.
• Money is raised for a child's school.
• A small debt gets paid off.
• I finally figured out one of my husband's idiosyncrasies.
• A child displays manners in public.
  

Each one can be rather mundane at the time, but when I take the time to look back at the task that was completed, it is rather fulfilling. It is one more checked off the list. Maybe next time I should take more time writing that check and enjoy what it truly means.

I am so proud of Jim and what he's accomplished these last 2 years. I know he's not the only one to complete a graduate degree while working full-time with a family, but it certainly is clear why not everyone does it. Congratulations honey, just a little bit more.

Dress-Up Monday

Today started off with Katherine being extra excited about wearing her princess dress that Mer bought for her in February of last year for Halloween. For some unknown reason, I packed it away after Halloween and forgot about it. So, I took it out last night and hung it on the closet door for her to see when she got up. I helped her put it on and she got down on her hands and knees, talked a little louder than normal, and proudly and very clearly pronounced to Nathan, "Look brother, I'm a princess."

Here she is checking herself out in the mirror after the fitting...














































I think she likes what she sees...























And the ever-so-important twirl test...























So then she thought she had wardrobing powers over the whole house and declared that she was going to pick out my clothes and brother's clothes. I got brother out of it by explaining that it's hard for him to crawl while wearing a dress. Her response: "Then can we put a dress on he when he get in the walker?"

I was not so lucky. She thumbed through all my shirts hanging up and pulled out a glitter leopard print halter top from my clubbing days. "Oh no, that one is scratchy," I said. "But, Mommy we would match." (The glitter, that is). So I carefully pulled the scratchy glitter leopard print halter top over my sunburned shoulders and lower back and said, "Ta da." Her face was less than thrilled. "Mommy, you need to take that off. You look silly."

Fine with me. Her next pick was another shirt from my clubbing days (I think she's picking these because she's never seen me wear them before and only God knows why I'm keeping them). She didn't like that one either. She asked for a dress that sparkled, so I pulled out a salmon and gold-sparkly dress that I think I wore once on our honeymoon. She liked the sparkly, but it wasn't long enough for her. Didn't twirl. I explained that this next choice was the last one I was going to put on. It was the dress I wore to our wedding rehearsal. I was just so happy it still fit and she liked it also.

The dress got some good wear today because it was on when I vacuumed, mopped, swiffered and polished all the floors, prepared lunch, ate lunch, loaded the dishwasher, took the mail outside and got them ready for naps.

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I wanted to get her on video singing this song. It's our family's kid theme song and is just too cute to forget about.





And this is Nathan's quirky way of letting us know he's not happy doing what he's doing.

July 4th Fun

We spent the 4th at "Bamah & Papa's Lake" and had another great day of water fun. Little lady spent some time building sand castles...


















playing with her big bud...


















getting plenty of sunscreened sun...
























jumping in the water, eating lots, splashing, playing and

WATER SKIING!


















Well, a 3-year-old's version of it, at least. She's still talking about it.

Then finally, a full day of playing hard with no nap caught up with her and Papa's lap looked like a perfect place to stop for the rest of the day.


















Little man had to celebrate Independence Day wearing his sister's pink polka dot hat. Mommy forgot his manly blue one at home.
























He enjoyed the sun and sand...























but not for long. It's hard on a pre-walker to be confined to the sand, grass, water or someone holding him the entire time. A very hot afternoon nap finally happened on Papa's lap (notice a trend here?)


















He was very happy to get inside and crawl on something familiar and comfortable.


















A side note: Mommy and Daddy's desperate attempts to hang on to their youth were successful another year. Daddy got up on the wakeboard. His falls have convinced him that he'll have a sinus infection within a day or two and he's ready to call in some antibiotics. Mommy got up on the slalom ski first try and was definitely more impressed with herself than anyone else was. Some showing off lead to some pretty good falls, but none the less, I made it up and didn't look like a walrus trying to leap on top of an iceberg.

So, the youth status hasn't totally fled the scene, but it has hopefully been delayed. Skiing always brings out pains in muscles that haven't been used in a while and to top it off, to get to the lake I had to descend 40 steps. Yes, 40, and I counted them every single time I ascended or descended them (it seemed like everything we needed was up those steps). So usually 48 hours after the unusual muscle exertion is when my pain really starts to set in. Tomorrow, I'm expecting to have to parent from the little green scooter Katherine used when learning to walk. Either that or the slider thing that goes under the car when changing oil. I could just attach a rope to it and tie it around Nathan's waist.

Two great days of water and sun fun. Our household is starting to feel the lightening of Daddy's school almost being over. What a wonderful feeling it is. Please keep Jim in your prayers. His defense is Wednesday and the final draft of his thesis has to be turned in the following Wednesday. He is so close and I couldn't be more proud of him. He will have completed his Master's of Science in 6 semesters with a 3.8 GPA, while working full-time and two part-time jobs and started a business. He is quite remarkable when he wants to be.

First Beach Trip

Today, we planned on going to the beach with our friends but it just didn't work out. So we decided to go anyway (we missed you F family). We chose Anastasia Island State Park and it was beautiful; hot but beautiful. Katherine is almost 3 1/2 and today was her first trip to the beach. She loved it.

She loved watching movies on the way over there.

She loved running on the boardwalk.























Her first look at a real live beach!


















We couldn't keep her close to us. She loved running on the beach.


















Nathan was close to nap-less so he preferred one-on-one contact the whole time. I'm sure the ocean can be scary for a first trip.





















































































Katherine enjoyed playing in a little wade pool, looking for sea shells, venturing out into the big waves with Daddy's help, eventually jumping over the waves with Mommy's help and chasing after the seagulls.

























































It was a fabulous day.


















When we got home, as you can imagine we were all grossified. Here's a picture of little man covered in bananas, apples, sweet potatoes with turkey and mixed vegetables with chicken. Also included was a nice mixture of sunscreen, sand in uncomfortable places and salty hair. The rinse-off showers at the park don't do much justice in the field of "cleaning"; I'm convinced they're more for "appeasing" mothers for the ride home.


















And then to top it all off, my big helper rinsed off all the bottle parts I washed, put them away and helped me make brownies for tomorrow's celebration. She couldn't wait for me to pour the batter into the pans. Hmmmm, wonder why.


















Today gave so many opportunities to teach her. There was a nature lesson (beach), a history lesson (Independence Day), a mathematics lesson (baking), more I just can't remember and the usual barrage of why questions. I enjoyed today immensely.

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On another note: little lady has started noticing differences in people's appearance and we've stepped into the realm of breath-holding when she is encountered with obvious physical differences. Some comments made in the last couple of days:

From the sound-proofed comfort of the inside of our car:
K: Mommy, that man has big boobies.

When talking to another man who loves her dearly, she said to him:
K: You have a big tummy.

And when she sees me enjoying a soft drink, she'll ask:
K: Mommy, is that the drink that makes your hiney smaller?