I WILL PROMISE THAT YOU WILL FIND SPELLING AND GRAMMAR ERRORS ALL OVER THE PLACE. I WAS A KINDERGARTEN TEACHER BECAUSE YOU ONLY HAVE TO SPELL THREE LETTER WORDS....
Summer Fun
We had had tons of fun this summer hanging out with friends and family. Brendan and Bryant came down and stayed for a week while Melanie was in a training. I love those boys!! They are so much fun. One day I had Molly, Ben, Kayla, Will, Brendan, & Bryant. We turned the backyard into a water park. Ben was taking a nap so outside everyone went. It was Africa hot outside so we started with water balloons and then just sprayed the hose all over the backyard. They turned the playground into a waterslide. They all had fun, got to be as loud as they wanted, and the grass got watered.
We got to keep Zoe, Caleb Anthony and Callie for a few days until Meme got home from DisneyWorld. Molly really enjoyed having the kids to play with. Zoe was a huge helper and so creative. They kids made a little pretend house and played for hours. I loved listening to them talk when the were so engrossed in playing they forgot anyone else was there.
Kayla and Will get to come and spend 8 days with us while Meredith does her inservice days before she starts her new job teaching at Cy Fair High School. I have lots of "school" activities planned and lots of trips to the splash pad.
I am so glad I have the minivan or we would be stuck at home with all these kids. I have decided the only way to stay sane with a house full is to get out of the house!!!
The BIG bike race
Our neighborhood has an annual 4th of July bike parade every year. All the kids decorate their bikes, trikes, & Wagons and we follow the firetruck to the pool. There is a contest for the best decorated bike then the firetruck sprays everyone and we play games in the pool area and eat. A good time is had by all. This year Molly was very excited about the "big bike parade" She wanted to help decorate her bike. We worked very hard decorating it and it was so cute. She kept saying that she wanted to win the big bike parade. Well she was the first kid into the parking lot on her bike so in her eyes she was the WINNER. We didn't win the decorating contest but Will won in the tricycle category. Although he wasn't riding a tricycle. He had an adorable trailer behind his bike. I am so using that for Ben when he is a little older!!
We were so thankful for the firetruck and their water, it has been SOOOOOOO hot here. It may have been the hottest June in the history of Texas.
Anniversary Cruise
Andrew and I celebrated our 10th Anniversary on June 12, 2009. I feel like we have been together forever. A lot has happened in that 10 years. I am so blessed to find a husband who compliments me so well. I love you Drew!!!
We celebrated our Anniversary with a Cruise to Progresso, Mexico and Cozumel and many fun days at sea. The best part is we got to go with friends. Jeff & Kari Miller (all the way from Ohio), Kara & Anthony Gordon, Chris & Misti Collins and Collin & Dori Wienken. It was so much fun being able to relax, eat good food, hang out with friends, read and do whatever we wanted.
I am so blessed to have so many people who I trust to keep my kids. Meredith and Brad kept the kids the first half and then Brad had surgery. Nanna came to Houston and kept them the second half. They had a ball and didn't even notice we were gone. Watch out, we may just have to do the kidless vacation again.
Happy Birthday Ben
I can't believe how fast Ben's first year went. Ben is such a little cutie pie. I am so in love with this little cutie pie. It was having a hard time imagining being able to love another kid as much as I love Molly, but as soon as I held him it didn't take long. I love his big, beautiful eyes that look just like his daddies. I love his sweet spirit. I love his funny little laugh complete with scrunched up nose. I love the way he lights up and starts to clap and giggle every time he see's Molly. I can't imagine life without that amazing little guy! I love you Ben-O!!
Check out the pictures from his Puppy Birthday Party.
I am so behind
Sorry, I am so behind on keeping up with this blog. I have finally uploaded the (hide in embarrassment) Christmas pictures and the Easter pictures. I will get all the things that go between Christmas and Easter up soon. Shutterfly keeps freezing up on me so it is taking a very long time. There has been a lot going on so hopefully I can get everything updated soon!
When It Rains it Pours!
Wow! When It Rains, It Pours!
Please be praying for my brother Neal and his wife Leah. We found out on December 30th that Leah has Inflammatory Breast Cancer. This is a very aggressive form of cancer but they will be doing very aggressive chemo treatments, followed by a double mastectomy and a complete hysterectomy. A meeting with the oncologist last week provided devastating news that the cancer has progressed to a stage 4 and has spread to her lungs. They will be doing a pet scan to confirm these results and to check for cancer in her brain. The doctors have said it is terminal. Pray for Leah, Neal, Zoe (8), Caleb Anthony (7), Caleb Taylor (5) and Callie (2) as they adjust to the news. God is a big God and he will do great and mighty things! The outpouring of support has been amazing. There are hundreds of people praying for them, their meals have been provided, groceries, toilet paper, gift cards and co-pays have been delivered at just the right time. God has showed his provision.
Now may God, the source of hope, fill you with all joy and peace as you believe, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13
At the same time please keep my precious little niece Maci in your prayers. Maci has been struggling with some gross motor skills for a few years. Ryan and Amanda have been searching for answers and Maci has been through many tests and they haven’t found an answer. January started out scary for them as the doctor suggested testing her for Muscular Dystrophy again. Good news is that the numbers came back elevated but not enough to be MD. They will be meeting with many doctors in the coming months to figure out why Maci can’t run and jump. Please pray for wisdom for the doctors and peace for Ryan, Amanda and Maci as they keep searching for an answer.
Happy Birthday Andrew!!!
Happy 32nd Birthday Andrew! Thank you for being such an amazing husband to me for the last 9 years and an incredible daddy to Molly and Ben. It isn’t always easy to put up with us some times. God knew what he was doing when he put us all 4 together. I hope you have a wonderful day and a fabulous year!
Oh and Happy Birthday to Meredith too. Meredith and Andrew share a birthday. One of many pairs of Birthday buddies in our family.
We wish you a Merry Christmas
Merry Christmas!!
It was really fun to celebrate Christmas this year with both kids. Molly really had fun decorating, baking, wrapping presents and writing notes to Santa every day! Mommy let go of having to have the tree just perfect and let Molly go to town with all the non-breakable ornaments. There were lots of ornaments all in one spot!! Ben loved looking at all the lights and this year left the tree alone.
As always I tried to get the PERFECT family picture for the Christmas card. We set up the camera with the tripod in the living room, then outside. Several hundred pictures later I still didn’t have the PERFECT picture. A good friend gave me some great advice and suggested sending the picture that really captured the kid’s personality. Well I had plenty of Molly with her eyes closed, tongue out and moving all over the place and Ben looking at the ground. It will be fun to look back and see the kid’s true personalities not the PERFECT posed family picture I was after.
We celebrated the Haywood family Christmas at our house this year. The kids had a ball opening presents. My favorite part of the day was Molly running around the house trying to find the “perfect” present for everyone from her. She gave Maci a book, Tyler a car, Nana bubbles and Papa a magazine she found in the bathroom all wrapped by her. Molly got the one thing she wanted the most….A Mickey Mouse Clubhouse!! Thanks Aunt Amanda! Ben had a ball watching everyone open presents and squeal in delight when they got just what they wanted and he really enjoyed eating the wrapping paper. We all enjoyed a little playtime outside on Molly’s swing set complete with a new glider swing. Amanda brought a gingerbread house for the kids to decorate. Who know it would take 5 adults to build it? It turned out super cute though. We really enjoyed our time together as a family, but missed getting to see Gran for Christmas this year!!
We have never been home the whole day on Christmas Eve and had no idea what to do with ourselves. We started the day with a special pancake breakfast made by daddy, followed by a morning full of baking cookies for Santa, cupcakes for Jesus’ birthday, and making reindeer food. The kitchen was covered in oatmeal, sprinkles, sugar, icing and laughter. We picked out the perfect cookies for Santa and sprinkled reindeer food for the reindeers. We all go to open the traditional 1 present on Christmas eve and it always happens to be Pajamas. We wrapped up the day by reading the Christmas story from Luke, and having a birthday party for Jesus. We loved that Molly is beginning to understand the true meaning of Christmas.
Christmas morning brought lots of present opening. We actually followed through with our promise to keep it low key and not go overboard on the presents. Good thing since they both liked the wrapping paper and boxes best. We headed over to Meme and Grandpa’s house to have breakfast and open presents one family at a time. This cuts down on the chaos…there are 22 of us after all. We had a great time eating and visiting and were blessed to have beautiful weather so we could send the kids outside to play. Neal’s gang didn’t get to join us because they were all sick and we really missed them. We had an great Christmas and I can’t wait until next year when Ben will get to join in the fun a little more.
Oh and the silent night I wished for, didn’t happen this year. Hopefully 2009 will be the year that dream comes true. Enjoy the pictures.
Thanksgiving
I love Thanksgiving!! I love the traditional thanksgiving food, well most of it. Who doesn't love a day where you can eat all the carbs and desserts you want, throw in a tiny little piece of turkey to say you had some protein and nobody bats an eye. Thanksgiving is such a fun time to slow down from our regular schedules and get together with everyone and reflect on all of our many blessings. We spread Thanksgiving out this year and really enjoyed celebrating (and eating) many times.
We headed off to east to celebrate with Nana, Papa, Gran, Ryan, Amanda, Maci & Tyler. It was a crazy weekend packed full of fun. We arrived in Friday night with a minivan full of gear. Molly loved having a big slumber party with Nana, Papa and Maci on a princess "nap mat". We headed out to on Saturday morning to spend some time with Gran. We went to Cracker Barrel for lunch and back to Gran's house to visit and take some pictures. I wish we had a video of the "photo session". The "grown up's" making faces, doing dances, doing anything to get all 4 kids to look up and smile at the same time. It was rather funny, but we got some cute pictures of the kids with Gran. After another night of cousin camping we attempted another photo shoot of the kids for Nana's Christmas present. All she asked for Christmas was a picture of all four Grandkids. Easy enough...or so we though. We got all the kids dressed in their matching outfits and headed out the duck pond. Maci sat and smiled like a supermodel in any position we put her in, she is a photographers dream. Ben sat up for the first time the week before and was still a little wobbly. He spent most of the time examining the grass and dirt...he was soaking wet and covered in mud when we were finished. Molly was Molly...all over the place. She has a habit of putting her hands in her mouth and doing this crazy smile and squint when a camera comes out. was a typical 1.5 year old boy, constant motion exploring everything around him. I think all of our nerves were a little frayed when we were finished. We were all exhausted and headed back to . Thanks Nana, Papa & Gran for having us and putting up with all the chaos that comes with us.
Thanksgiving #2 was a grand gathering of 32 people at Meme and Grandpa's house. Lots of friends, family and food. The kids got to go visit Ms. 's horses and feed them while we got dinner ready. Molly loved feeding the horses carrots and apples right from her hand. We were so thankful for beautiful weather, the kids ate and played outside and it was relatively calm inside. Did I mention my mom makes the world’s best mashed potatoes??? We had a great time and headed home after lunch to take a nice long "thanksgiving" nap.
Thanksgiving Day was nice and relaxing. A little more Thanksgiving food and planning for black Friday.
I love a good deal!!! Black Friday is a bargain hunter’s paradise. I combed over the Black Friday ads and decided what I "needed" or wanted and made a plan. I hit Michaels and Garden Ridge on Thursday night and then I headed out on Friday morning around to start shopping. Yes, I was one of the crazy people shopping in the middle of the night. I was in and out of Kohl's in 9 min. with everything I planned to get. Headed over to Wal-Mart and was in and out in 12 min. That was a store full of CRAZY!!! Next on to Babies R Us they had the toys I wanted without the Toys R Us line, there were only 5 people in the store. Next stop Target in and out in 6 min. I was home by right in time for Andrew and the kids to wake up. I had lots of fun shopping and can't wait to go again next year!
Happy Fall Ya'll!
We made it through all the Fall Holidays!
Molly couldn't decide what she wante to be for Halloween so she wore all of her favorite clothes from our dress up chest. She was a pink puffy princess for her school fall festival. She was a purple butterfly princess on Halloween night for our church fall festival. Ben dressed up in the adorable little ducky costume Molly wore her first halloween. We went to our churches fall festival. It was amazing, tons of bounce housed, carnival games, square dancing, fire trucks and all our friends. Molly's favorite candy was Smarties, she ate her weight in smarties Friday night and they all mysteriously vanished the next day. A good time was had by all!
Ben is 4 months old
Everything checked out great at Ben's 4 month well baby check up with Dr. Worrall.
Weight: 15lbs , 50th percentile
Height: 25 in, 50th percentile
Head: 42 cm, 50th percentile
Milestones: Rolling over from back to tummy, laughing, cooing, graps a rattle, follow toys 180 degrees, recognizes mommy.
Likes: Watching Molly, checking out the monkeys on his quilt, Exersaucer, Jumperoo, Playmat, sunggling with his fireman, afternoon naptime
Dislikes: Tummy time, Riding in the carseat
I can't believe it has been 4 months since Ben was born. It feels like just yesterday he decided to come into this world at world record speeds. I am head over heels in love with this little man! I feel so blessed to have such a sweet baby boy and pray that he will grow up to love God more than anything. I love you little Ben delicious!
PS: I am writing these because this is serving as his baby book too...maybe he will get a real one soon!
The pumpkin patch
We went to the Spring Creek Growers pumpkin patch today with some of our friends and had a great time. We took some pumpking patch pictures, raced around the tricycle track, went for a hayride, played in the tree house and climbed on the hay piles. It was great fun. Ben slept most of the time while Molly had fun playing with her friends. We had a tough morning so we almost didn't go, but I am so glad we did. Check out the pictures in the picture album section.
Happy 4th Birthday Maci!!
We had so much fun at Maci's Build a Bear Birthday party tonight. Aunt Amanda really knows how to throw a party. She always has every detail covered and last night was no exception. I especially loved the beautiful teddy bear cake Amanda made, she is one talented cake maker. Maci was precious opening her presents, a perfect little squeel when she saw something that she really liked. Molly was thrilled Maci liked the Mickey Mouse game she picked out for her.
It was our first trip to build a bear and Molly had so much fun. We loved watching all the kids pick their animals and the outfits to go with them. Maci got a pink cheeta with a Sleeping Beauty outfit named Princess. Molly picked out a zebra to stuff and named it Maggie. Please notice that Maggie has on Hello Kitty panties...only Molly. Maggie is our new best friend she walks on a leash and comes everywhere we do. She does have to sleep in her house at night so she doesn't run away though.
Happy 4th Birthday Maci girl! You are such a sweet little girl and a joy to be around. I love to watch your face light up when you get excited and your eyes glow when you smile. We are so blessed to have you in our lives and can't wait to see what God has in store for you!
Budding Fashion Designer...Not
We have a very busy schedule with playgroups, Mother's Day out, Bible Studies & Birthday parties. Friday we enjoyed a nice, relaxing day at home to catch up on laundry, cleaning and just to play with all the toys filling our gameroom. We call these days Jammie days, because we don't even get out of our jammies. Molly decided to play dress up and started by dressing Ben up in a blue tutu with pink and purple ribbons complete with a purple hair bow. He will love that picture when he grows up!!! Then she dressed herself up. She couldn't take off her jammies or it wouldn't be Jammie day anymore and jammie day is fun. So she put her dress up clothes over her jammies. Blue and white polka dotted nightgown, hot pink flowered jammie pants, pink leotard, pink tutu, black Sunday shoes and bed head. She was a sight to see....and everyone that was in WalMart on Friday night got to see her. Andrew took her to WalMart in her "costume". We have a closet full of beautiful clothes and we wear our "costume" to the store....oh to be 3 again.
Just Say NO to Training Toothpaste
One of my favorite pastimes is cruising Target for clearance items. Who doesn't like a good deal? Sometimes this leads to my buying something I would not normally purchase....like training toothpaste. Blue gel you brush on toddlers teeth to help show them where the plaque is so they can brush it all the way off with the toothpaste. It was $1 and anything to help Molly learn to brush properly. Andrew said "Why did you buy this? This is an accident waiting to happen." She brushed like a champ the first few nights and her teeth were sparkling, I was earning my mom of the year points. On Day 3 of training toothpaste I was upstairs putting Ben to bed and the paste was downstairs. Molly went to get it so we could brush upstairs tonight because I was on my own for bedtime. She got up the stairs with blue all over her face and said as sweetly as she could "I made a little mess." I replied "Is there blue anywhere besides your face?" Molly said "yep, just a little bit on the carpet." I go around the corner to find a blue training toothpaste trail up the stairs, through the game room, all the way to the kid’s bathroom. I was certain Andrew was going to kill us. This was not a good thing....very light carpet and blue food coloring there was no hiding the mess. I searched the internet because you can find anything on the internet and found that I may be able to get it up if I acted quickly. I got several clean rags, a cup of warm water, soapy water and a cup of cold water and began to scrub. Andrew walked in to see me on the stairs with my cleaning set up and Molly on the top step watching. Molly said "Daddy, we made a mess and it was an accident. Mommy is trying her best to make it all better so don't be sad with us." He rolled his eyes and said "You threw the rest away....right??" He put Molly to bed and I kept scrubbing. 3 hours later it all finally came out.
I am SEW cute....
Cheesey title, I know....
I have taken up sewing...kind of. I love the cute botique outfits, but just can't pay that kind of money for kids clothes. My mom has been begging me for years to learn to sew, so I took her up on the offer. I made her a zebra outfit and she looks so cute in it. I am so proud I finished a project and I think it is really cute! Hopefully there will be many more! I bought lots of fabric to attempt a few more creations. You may see on in the Haywood family Christmas card this year, if I can get some time alone to work on it.
Thanks Mom
Yippie!! Kari is coming to town!!
I got the best phone call this morning!! Kari, Kenzi and Jenna are coming to Houston to visit in 3 weeks!!!! I am still trying to get over Jeff moving them all the way up to Ohio. It may have been the best choice for their family, but it wasn't the best choice for me. I really miss her!!!!! Hopefully, we can squeeze in a few trips to Target and Sonic while she is here.
Take a Hike IKE
Seriously, when Molly was a baby, Hurricane Rita hit the Gulf coast and now that Ben is here Ike headed our way. Maybe if I don't have anymore babies we won't have anymore hurricanes in Houston??? We decided we were not going to evacuate after the horrible experience of evacuating for Hurricane Rita. When Rita came, we decided that we needed to be responsible parents and take Molly out of harms way to a safe spot where she would be comfortable with lights, power and no chance of fallen trees or flooding. I packed Molly up in the car and we headed to Nacogdoches a few days before Rita was going to hit. What a great reason to go visit Nana and Papa and play with Maci. It only took us 3.5 hours to make a 2.5 hour trip, not too bad. Andrew left at 2:00 a.m. and it took him 8.5 hours to get there with Bob, our dog. Well, our house back in Houston didn't even get a raindrop or a cloud in the sky. Nacogdoches got hit pretty badly with lots of fallen trees, flooding, and no power. All of that I could live with...but 3 of the 8 people in the 3 bedroom house with no power got some sort of stomach virus, Andrew being one of them... that I could not live with. Do you know how quiet it is when there is no power? Do you know how much I can't stand the sound of throw up? It was a long night and an even longer 6.5 hour drive home. Because a barge was stuck under highway 59 on the Trinity River, we went home through College Station and Andrew kept having to pull over every once in a while to puke. I vowed then I would not leave for another hurricane unless it was a cat 4 or 5 and headed right for us and then I would head to Dallas or Cleveland, Ohio (here we come Kari)! So long story short, we didn't evacuate for IKE!! We stocked up on water and canned foods, filled the tubs with water, put the kids to sleep in our closet and watched the news until the power went out at 2 a.m. Oh, and Andrew mowed the yard and trimmed the bushes, because you can't have a storm without a pretty yard. You gotta love the round the clock hurricane coverage. Someone deserves a medal for some of the creative stories they come up with to fill the 24hours of nothing but IKE coverage. I wonder if anyone counted the times they said "hunker down." Andrew was in heaven watching the wind and rain. He had a spotlight shining out the back window trying to make sure his shed didn't blow over. We didn't board up the windows on the house, we used our wood to make sure the shingles on the shed didn't blow away. The neighbor called to see why my crazy husband was outside in the middle of a hurricane. Thankfully the kids slept right through all the wind and rain. I don't know how because it was LOUD. The trees were blowing sideways, all the leaves on our crape myrtles blew off, and there were shingles everywhere (luckily none were ours). When Molly finally woke up and came to look out the window she said in true Molly fashion "Wow, that is beautiful! When will God turn off the rain so I can go outside and play?" We were blessed in that we had no storm damage. We did however, rough it through 12 days of no power. Big trees are beautiful but they did a number on the power lines!
We learned a lot of things from Ike.
1. People are amazing! The generosity was overwhelming. Thank you Matt and Tara for letting us spend the night and to all those who offered. Thanks Meredith and Leah for letting me do laundry, it was starting to stink! Thanks Kristee and David for the generator and AC unit!!!!! Thanks Connie and Mandy for hanging out and sharing dinner in the front yard. Thanks Meme and Grandpa for the yummy food on the grill...Meme is always prepared for a hurricane! Thanks everyone who called to check on us.
2. You can cook almost anything on the grill! We had chicken enchilladas, scrambled eggs, bacon, new potatos, veggies, toast, lasagna, mac and cheese...not all at the same time though.
3. You must think through your actions!! Our first didn't think it through moment: You need power to run the disposal, and if you put all the leftovers from the fridge that doesn't work in the disposal with no power you have to scoop it all out by hand and hope you got it all. Hot mac and cheese emits a very funky odor. Our Second didn't think it through moment: Clean out the WHOLE freezer. Those chicken livers Andrew is saving for fishing, well just because they are for fish and won't give us food poisioning, they will start to stink if left to sit in the freezer with no power. Once Andrew finally discovered what was making that horrible smell coming from our laundry room he promptly headed to the trash can with them only to run into Molly on the way spilling them on the laundry floor and the garage floor. Hot chicken livers STINK, no they really stink. We had to throw away the whole trash can can they were in. Our neighbor 5 doors down came over to find out what smelled so bad and duct taped a trash bag over the top of the can to help keep the smell down.
4. You could easily tell the "haves" and "have nots": Those with power had pretty hair, ironed clothes, talked about the wonderful meal they cooked last night on the stove, and told you all about what happend on Greys Anatomy the night before. Those without power had bags under their eyes, wrinkled clothes, smelled like gasoline from the generators running all night and didn't bring thier "A game" in the hair department, and their breakfast consisted of squeeze cheese, crackers and a hot bottle of water and were "hunkered down" over the crank radio listening to the DJ's say "just go to this website for more information on how you can get help."
5. I really could live without power if I had to. It was HOT, we had some funny meals, it gets VERY dark very early but it wasn't the end of the world. I really do like air conditioning though.
I better go get stocked up for Hurricane Season 2009
"I got a GREAT idea"
I got the bright idea to have a garage sale over Labor Day weekend. (Next time I have this idea remind me how much work a garage sale is...) So, we got all our old junk out and scrubbed it up so it could be someone else’s "great deal" and we could make some money to buy some more junk to stock our next garage sale with. I was amazed at how cheap some people are... One lady insisted that the Gap maternity jeans were not worth the $5 I was asking they were only worth $1...I kept telling her fine leave them here; you are not getting them for a dollar. She kept trying for about 30 min and finally left with them for $5.
Anyways after a long, hot day of garage saleing (is that a word) I put Molly down for her nap after she spent the day watching TV, drawing on the driveway with sidewalk chalk and basically being ignored (I know, bad mommy). She woke up from her nap and said in classic Molly fashion...envision hands up by her face, shoulders shrugged, face all scrunched up..."Mommy, I got a great idea!!! Let's go to the minivan store and see if there are any minivans whose doors open up all by themselves." Oh, yeah did I mention that my 3 year old is obsessed with minivans. Her favorite are white minivans with 2 doors that open up all by themselves. She wants to be a minivan designer when she grows up and has been begging for one of her own for quite some time now.
We went to tell daddy about her great idea and we packed up the whole family and headed out to the minivan store to see if there were any doors unlocked and to see how long we could "play" before a sales person attacked us. We finally found a blue minivan that was unlocked and had 1 door that opened all by itself. Molly was thrilled. She jumped in and started sitting down in each of the 8 seats and buckling the seat belts. I started playing around with the seats seeing how you could move them around and checking out all the latch and teather locations because I am a bit of a car seat freak. You can put 6 car seats in this baby!! Andrew even got in on the fun, did I mention he isn't a minivan kind of guy. We were having so much fun we didn't notice the sales person walk up on us...we were trapped. We finally escaped and took the hot, now overtired kids home to feed them and put them to bed. Andrew looked the van up on the computer that night and the price was much lower than what the salesman had quoted so he said well maybe we should go drive it in the morning. Mind you we were having a garage sale the next morning...not sure when he though I would be free to test drive cars. Besides we had a babysitter lined up that night so we could have a date night we should just go then. Well he went to test drive the van Saturday morning while I manned the garage sale and he became a minivan convert. He loved the way it drove and all the bells and whistles. He called to tell me we needed it right now!! They accidentally published the price it was traded in for on the internet, and they had to honor it and someone else had an appointment to drive it in 30 min. We must buy it NOW! Next thing I know Andrew and the sales guy are in front of the house with a pretty new minivan that seats 8, has one door that opens up all by itself, has 17 cup holders, the seats fold into the floor, and there is a DVD player in this thing (don't tell Molly, she still doesn't know about that). They let me drive it around the block and I was sold! As Meredith and I were cleaning up the garage sale mess Andrew came home with our very own Minivan! Molly was thrilled, she is in love!!! She did ask us about a week after we got it why there was only one door that opens all by itself and not two. I replied "well honey, Daddy only had enough money for one door to open all by itself" later that afternoon she handed me her piggy bank and said "here you go mommy some money to buy a minivan that has two doors that open all by themselves." She is a little cutie pie.
We always told my mom she needed to write a book about all our antics and name it My Life In A Station Wagon; well I think I now need to name my sight my life in a minivan.
And to all you minivan haters out there....I was one of you once, but not anymore. Yes, it is a bit of a mom mobile but I worked really hard to be a mom so I will drive my minivan with pride!
Oh yeah....Does anyone want to buy a 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee????
My silly little monkey
We were a little worried about how Molly would adjust to being a big sister. She has after all been the little princess for 3 years now and was about to be dethroned. I have to say she has done rather well we have only had a few little "issues". Bedtime being one of them....We have really tried to make sure she gets to bed in time and follows the same bedtime routine daily. We had gotten a little lax towards the end of the pregnancy and she was listening to the calming songs of Bob and Larry's backyard bar-b-q. and Veggie Tales road trip...Needless to say we switched from music to the white noise machine again. Things had been going very well for the last few weeks and we were very pleased with our stellar parenting skills. Then last week we started hearing "Mommy, I need you." One of us would go in and the following conversation would take place.
Mom- "What Molly"
Molly "I need something"
Mom "Molly what do you need?"
Molly "UMMMM, I need UMMMM, a drink of water, socks, a hug, the light on in the closet so I can see my pretty clothes, ________ fill in the blank with some stalling technique.
We decided to stop going in to check on her after we were sure she had all her hugs, kisses, drinks of water, and was all tucked into BED. Well, last Wednesday night she was wired because she was going to Nana's with Maci for the weekend and just couldn't fall asleep. We heard the now familiar "Mommy, I need you" and it began to get louder and louder. Andrew goes up to check on her and yells "Jill get up here." I walk in her room to see Molly lying on the floor of her dollhouse bookshelf with her head stuck in one of the windows. Being the concerned parents that we are we quickly ran to get a screwdriver to undo the top of the bookshelf and the camera so we can laugh about this for a long time to come.
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